A delightful excursion through the Yiddish language, the culture it defines and serves, and the fine art of complaint

Throughout history, Jews around the world have had plenty of reasons to lament. And for a thousand years, they've had the perfect language for it. Rich in color, expressiveness, and complexity, Yiddish has proven incredibly useful and durable. Its wonderful phrases and idioms impeccably reflect the mind-set that has enabled the Jews of Europe to survive a millennium of unrelenting persecution . . . and enables them to kvetch about it!

Michael Wex—professor, scholar, translator, novelist, and performer—takes a serious yet unceasingly fun and funny look at this remarkable kvetch-full tongue that has both shaped and has been shaped by those who speak it. Featuring chapters on curse words, food, sex, and even death, he allows his lively wit and scholarship to roam freely from Sholem Aleichem to Chaucer to Elvis.

Perhaps only a khokhem be-layle (a fool, literally a "sage at night," when there's no one around to see) would care to pass up this endearing and enriching treasure trove of linguistics, sociology, history, and folklore—an intriguing appreciation of a unique and enduring language and an equally fascinating culture.

Greta Beigel, concert pianist-turned-journalist, looks back, sometimes in horror, often with humor at (dysfunctional) Jewish family life lived under the umbrella of apartheid in South Africa circa the '50s and '60s. Here, assorted abuses--psychological, physical, spiritual, cutural and of course political--rule. In "Kvetch," her memoir of shadow and light, Greta illuminates different worlds: e.g. She explores Orthodox Judaism, its delicious foods, rituals and customs, while inhabiting multiple roles on two continents: Child piano prodigy—and wounded daughter--wowing Johannesburg audiences at an early age, Elvis-worshipping teen, naive newlywed and finally, California journalist covering the arts at the Los Angeles Times, and joy upon joy interviewing music luminaries such as Van Cliburn, Beverly Sills, Murray Perahia, Esa-Pekka Salonen. Christian Tetzlaff, Byron Janis and more.

Greta Beigel, concert pianist-turned-journalist, looks back, sometimes in horror, often with humor at (dysfunctional) Jewish family life lived under the umbrella of apartheid in South Africa circa the '50s and '60s. Here, assorted abuses--psychological, physical, spiritual, cutural and of course political--rule. In "Kvetch," her memoir of shadow and light, Greta illuminates different worlds: e.g. She explores Orthodox Judaism, its delicious foods, rituals and customs, while inhabiting multiple roles on two continents: Child piano prodigy—and wounded daughter--wowing Johannesburg audiences at an early age, Elvis-worshipping teen, naive newlywed and finally, California journalist covering the arts at the Los Angeles Times, and joy upon joy interviewing music luminaries such as Van Cliburn, Beverly Sills, Murray Perahia, Esa-Pekka Salonen. Christian Tetzlaff, Byron Janis and more.

Hold on to your yarmulkes. Ken Krimstein has put together a matzo-ball-soup-through-your-nose funny collection of his unorthodox (sometimes Reform) Jewish-themed cartoons. This book will make you laugh, eat, and feel guilty all at once. It’s like your Jewish mother that way.

Speaking of which, would it kill you to call her?

Taking on all things “Tribe” from the High Holidays to J-date, Kvetch As Kvetch Can is the perfect guilty pleasure (just add it to the list!)

In the town of Oyville, the children were preparing for Hanukkah. But the kvetch who lived high on the hill said what he said every year: "The latkes smell bad, the dreidels make me dizzy, and to hear children laugh puts me in a tizzy." This year, will Hanukkah represent another great miracle, finally bringing a smile to the kvetch's face?

As the main spoken language of the Jews for more than a thousand years, Yiddish has had plenty to lament, plenty to conceal. Its phrases and expressions paint a comprehensive picture of the mind-set that enabled the Jews of Europe to survive persecution: they never stopped kvetching about God, gentiles, children, and everything else.

In Born to Kvetch, Michael Wex looks at the ingredients that went into this buffet of disenchantment and examines how they were mixed together to produce an almost limitless supply of striking idioms and withering curses. Born to Kvetch includes a wealth of material that's never appeared in English before.

This is no bobe mayse (cock-and-bull story) from a khokhem be-layle (idiot, literally a "sage at night" when no one's looking), but a serious yet fun and funny look at a language. From tukhes to goy, meshugener to kvetch, Yiddish words have permeated and transformed English as well. Through the fascinating history of this kvetch-full tongue, Michael Wex gives us a moving and inspiring portrait of a people, and a language, in exile.

A delightful excursion through the Yiddish language, the culture it defines and serves, and the fine art of complaint

Throughout history, Jews around the world have had plenty of reasons to lament. And for a thousand years, they've had the perfect language for it. Rich in color, expressiveness, and complexity, Yiddish has proven incredibly useful and durable. Its wonderful phrases and idioms impeccably reflect the mind-set that has enabled the Jews of Europe to survive a millennium of unrelenting persecution . . . and enables them to kvetch about it!

Michael Wex—professor, scholar, translator, novelist, and performer—takes a serious yet unceasingly fun and funny look at this remarkable kvetch-full tongue that has both shaped and has been shaped by those who speak it. Featuring chapters on curse words, food, sex, and even death, he allows his lively wit and scholarship to roam freely from Sholem Aleichem to Chaucer to Elvis.

Perhaps only a khokhem be-layle (a fool, literally a "sage at night," when there's no one around to see) would care to pass up this endearing and enriching treasure trove of linguistics, sociology, history, and folklore—an intriguing appreciation of a unique and enduring language and an equally fascinating culture.