Notices by Mordecai Martin (mordecaimartin@rage.love)

The question I was asked was roughly "can you not spare a thought for the Jewish descendants of the ancestors you write so lovingly of?" And the truth is I can and do. I am that descendant. Sometimes I think I think in Yiddish because it's yet another way to think of myself.

This is all getting very solipsistic. What does thinking of myself, or the dead, or Yiddish, none of which are synonyms for each other, have to do with my position on Palestine, and why it must be free?

When I think of the dead, I think they want better for me and mine. That means a Free Palestine. When I think for myself, I know that I must break with the foolish Zionism that I was taught. That means a Free Palestine. As for Yiddish? Well Yiddish was the language of a world that suffered innumerable losses, never to be regained, when its speakers were kept in an open air prison and then decimated by a military regime. So that too, leads me to say Free Palestine.

In doing this, I want to avoid twisting or turning Yiddish into something it is not. Yiddish is NOT an "inherent" or even conditional language of resistance to Zionism, despite others using it as such. It IS an Ashkenazi Jewish language, and as such, has been used for just about every type of Ashkenazi Jewish thought, including Zionism

I guess what Yiddish is to me, with my dusty old books and scanned decaying newspapers, is a language of the dead. And what are the Dead to this conversation of Israel and Palestine? What they often are: An inheritance, a warning. But to me, they are more. They are my family. I am at home with my dead. Sometimes more than I am with the living. Sometimes, I think my clinical anxiety is a way of bridging that gap, every fear a wish. I think about horrible things happening to myself and others, so that we might . . . be more comfortable with each other. Because the dead are comfortable. They do not complain, nor do they praise. They say what they've said and stick with it. They are as happy or dismayed of us as we imagine they might be. Indeed, they are often creatures of our imagination, our ancestors.

I was asked why I as a translator of Yiddish, as a writer who works with his Jewish ancestors, why do I only post Free Palestine, why don't I post about the horrors being faced by fellow Jews in this war. It was a bad faith question, meant to rile me. But I'm thinking it over. I've talked elsewhere about why I think it is necessary to stand for a Free Palestine, a goal for the Holy Land that we are far short of, and I fear is growing more distant with this war. I've talked about how shameful I find the actions of the so-called "Jewish" state of Israel. So I'd like to just reflect on what my Yiddish work has to do with any of this, why spending time with my ancestors in that form leads me to the position I find myself in.

@perigee they happen. The person in question has two kids in the IDF. She is certainly very scared, and probably has a right to be. I think it's interesting to note that the post that she was responding to was just fundraising for a children's organization that works in Gaza. She asked me why I don't advocate for Jewish children, the descendants of the Yiddish speakers I translate. I'm thinking seriously about her question, though it was meant in bad faith.

@evel It's true, and the truth is, as an American Jewish writer, I have to produce culture that undermines both regimes (which smarter people than me argue are really one regime, and I'm inclined to agree)

Got my first "how dare you how could you post that" message of this war. Ah well.

Here in the attached image is a story I wrote about my dismay at the cowardice and complicity of American Jewish institutions with the violence of Zionism against the Palestinian people. I apologize for the lack of Alt text, I didn’t think it would fit

Once again, I am a Jewish writer in a moment when a state claiming to represent Jewish culture exists, and violently enforces itself on a population of Jews and Palestinians. My mission is clear: I must make culture that betrays Israel, and stands for a Free Palestine.

@anarchiv eeeeeeeeeeyyyyyyyyyyyy

Sometimes eating some stinky cheese on toast and some sour pickles . . . well, it's just about the closest I can get to Heaven right now,

@CaribenxMarciaX Crack us up, make us dance!

@CaribenxMarciaX Glad to hear it. Academia's environment is brutal, uncaring, and racist. It is horrible that we have allowed them to claim so much space in the realm of the life of the mind and spirit. Just disgraceful. Glad you're protecting yourself from that.

Finished translating and reading the first part of Leon Pozument's spy murder mystery, "A House In Staten Island!"

Who is Ivan Strokov?!

Who wanted him dead?!

And why did his Treyfene Chumash (A new testament) go missing from the Abramovitches' boarding house the night of his murder?

Best sentences I translated yesterday: The New York newspapers didn’t even concern their first pages with the news of Ivan Strokov’s murder in an ex lover’s Harlem bedroom.

Best sentences I translated today: That he wasn’t in America for more than two years, and that he came there from Paris, was news to the family Abramovitch. He spoke, they said, English “like Water”, and seemed “entirely Americanized.”

Instead of berating yourself for failing to meet an arbitrary productivity goal you set for yourself, consider: it is Shabbos

Rainy day in PJs and big stack of books, is the plan

@anarchiv You're too sweet

@anarchiv Fantastic! Lock down european rights on me, why don'tcha?

I recently was invited to reflect on this piece for an interview, and it reminded me of how proud I am of it, both its central conceit and its execution. Please give it a read

http://www.thetinymag.com/mordecai-martin

@crybaby ah see, I’m in the conservationist camp there. Preserve the smell of fish and potatoes!