Greetings All...
I would amend slightly Charles' proposal: Let the text (only 15 words
-- maybe one line in each language) also be in Yiddish -- it costs but
an extra line.
My GF who migrated from Podhajce to Czernowitz spoke Yiddish; My
father, born there in 1903 spoke Yiddish; there were several Yiddish
newspapers in Czernowitz. In fact remembering the tales of my GF,
there was a rich Yiddish culture in the city at the start of the 20th
century.
The nexus of Yiddish and Czernowitz is further exemplified by the 1908
Yiddish language conference being held there.
Artistically, I consider the orthography of the Hebrew alphabet, which
has a haunting beauty in its own right, setting off a contrast to the
starkness of the Roman and Cyrillic alphabets on the plaque.
To me anyway, a plaque honouring the man who tried to save the city's
Jews that had not a single Hebrew letter on it obscures who we were
and who we are.
Just my two pfennig worth...
jerome
On Wed, 30 Apr 2008 01:47:59 -0700, Charles Rosner
<frenchczern1_at_yahoo.com> wrote:
> Hi Mimi and All!
> I believe that the plaque should be in three languages - and I'm
> convinced that the municipality can accept this request - thus
> reflecting the very dense history of the city: Ukrainian, because it
> is today in Ukraine; Rumanian, because Traian Popovici was Rumanian
> and his deeds were during the Rumanian rule; and German, because of
> the old and long Austrian rule and of the fact that the Jews he
> saved spoke German. Most (if not all) Jews in Cz spoke that
> language, whereas Yiddish was more spoken in smaller towns and
> Shtettls of Bukowina.
> As for the text itself, let's mix both proposals you have by now:
> "Mayor of this city in 1941: he was a righteous man who saved 20,000
> Jews"
> Regards,
> Charles
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Received on 2008-04-30 16:28:42
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