Books

[debka_notion]

Today's Book Amusements:
1. Two people have written books entitled G-d; A Biography (without the dash). I find this somewhat improbable.

2. There is a hebrew book by the title of Dubim VaYa'ar. After Lishma, this amuses me quite a bit. Once my binder arrives, I'll be able to cite the textual sorces, but- it's just such an strange and unbalanced story, and to make an idiom of it is just priceless.

3. Why can't the Library of Congress tell the difference between Hebrew and Yiddish?

Comments

[arib.livejournal.com]

There is a hebrew book by the title of Dubim VaYa'ar.

bears and fear?

[debka-notion.livejournal.com]

Bears and forest- refering to the talmudic discussion I forget where about the story about the group of children who come and make fun of the prophet Elisha because he's bald and G-d sends two she-bears to kill the children. The talmudic argument is whether or not there was one miracle or two- the bears, or the forrest from which the bears came And the bears. So there's a saying "lo dubim v'lo ya'ar". I've forgotten the precise usage of the saying, but I'm going to find out as soon as I can catch one of the other Lishma folks.

[theshrewd.livejournal.com]

Uh... cause the Library of Congress is connected to Congress, which is primarily comprised of WASPs and completely comprised of idiots?

[marlowe1.livejournal.com]

And of course there's always Teddy Bear Cannibal Massacre (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0976654601/ref=cm_bg_f_1/002-5011450-1280803?v=glance)

[spazerrific.livejournal.com]

On #3... b/c there are no Brandeis grads? :-p

[sovevuni.livejournal.com]

Because most people cannot tell the difference between Hebrew and Yiddish. :) (A lame excuse, I know!)

[debka-notion.livejournal.com]

But you'd think the national Library would be able to- I mean, it's really not that hard to tell. And if people can catalog the books to begin with most of the time, they have to know the language... And well, this is an institution of librarians, who you think would care.

[rymenhild.livejournal.com]

That's really very odd. One would definitely think the L of C could afford to hire a librarian trained in Hebrew and at least possessing enough skills to recognize Yiddish.

[lordameth.livejournal.com]

Speaking of which, I know it's alot to ask, but wouldn't it be great if the massive collection of foreign language books at the Boston Public Library were in some kind of order?

[debka-notion.livejournal.com]

You'd think- but they have several books that are in Yiddish or some mix of Yiddish and English coded with Hebr at the end of their catalog codes. It's strange- recognizing Yiddish just isn't that hard.