3: Last lines of Jacob Glatshteyn's 'Good Night, World" as translated by various translators, 1939–1993.

3: Last lines of Jacob Glatshteyn's 'Good Night, World" as translated by various translators, 1939–1993.

Many different translators have translated Yankev Glatshteyn’s poem, “Good Night, World.” Every translation reflects the choices of the translator and is informed by the cultural moment in which it is published.

Suggested Activities: Have students read each of the different translations of the last line of the poem out loud. What differences do you notice in word choice and meaning? What similarities do you notice? How is your understanding of the poem affected by these similarities and differences? 

One of the translators, Spiegel, chose to add an extra line that doesn’t appear in the Yiddish. How does this extra line affect your understanding of the poem?

Sources: Anita Norich, “Becoming American- Yiddish in the Golden Land” (presentation, Stroum Lectures, University of Washington, 2006), YouTube, 17:48.

Yankev Glatshteyn, “Back to the Ghetto,” trans. Joseph Leftwich, The Golden Peacock (London: Robert Anscombe and Co., 1939).

Yankev Glatshteyn, "Good Night, World," trans. Moshe Spiegel, Chicago Jewish Forum: A National Quarterly 26, no. 1 (Fall 1967).

Yankev Glatshteyn, “Good Night, World,” trans. Ruth Whitman, Delos: A Journal on and of Translation 2 (1968).

Yankev Glatshteyn, “Good Night, World,” trans. Marie Syrkin, A Treasury of Yiddish Poetry, eds. Irving Howe and Eliezer Greenberg (New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1969.

Yankev Glatshteyn, “Good Night, World,” trans. Etta Blum, Jacob Glatstein: Poems (Tel Aviv: I.L. Peretz Publishing House, 1970).

Yankev Glatshteyn, “Good Night, World,” trans. Barbara Harshav and Benjamin Harshav, American Yiddish Poetry, (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007).

Yankev Glatshteyn, "Good Night, World," trans. Richard Fein, Selected Poems of Yankev Glatshteyn (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1987).

Yankev Glatshteyn, "Good Night, World," trans. Barnett Zumoff, I Keep Recalling (New York: Ktav Publishing House, 1993).