Sorry everybody, just when I got done posting this thread I ran out of time on the library computer, so I have had some reading to do to catch up (especially what with the very interesting thread George Seto came up with - and which a Digitrad/Forum search had missed). The impetus for my question came from a thread started about a week ago on the Usenet Newsgroup soc.culture.esperanto. Here's the first post in that thread:

Saluton al ^ciuj,

de tagoj sekvas min la melodio de donna, donna, donna kaj mi finfine ^cerpis el la kongresa kantareto de la IJK en Veszprèm la tekston. Sed strange -- kial en tia trista kanto oni alvokas damon?

Mi do ser^cis supozitan italan originalon. Vane ser^cante mi eksciis ke estis de judo en la varsovia getto kiu ^jus vidis naziojn mortenpeli sian familion -- povraj bovidoj! Kaj ke (a)donaj signifas en la jida originalo mia sinjoro.

Malfeli^ce la esperantotraduko sekvas la anglan version, ^ce Joan Baez ne tute fidela kaj ^ce Donovan e^c malpli. Almena^u donaj povus resti tia a^u tradukiti. Ne estante poeto mi provis nur la^ueble fideli al la originalo kaj tamen konservi la ritmon. ^Guu tamen a^u plibonigu:

Yiddish

1. Ojfn forel ligt a kelbl,
   ligt gebundn mit a schtrick,
   hojch am himml fligt a foigl
   fligt und drejt sich hin un tsrik
   
   Lacht der wind in korn,
   
   lacht un lacht un lacht
   
   lacht erop a tog a gantsn
   
   un a halbe nacht
   
   
   donaj, donaj, donaj, donaj,
   donaj, donaj, donaj, don,
   donaj, donaj, donaj, donaj,
   donaj, donaj, donaj, don
   
   
2. Schreit dos kelbl, sagt der pojer,
   wer-ssche hejst dich sajn a kalb?
   Wolst gekent doch sain a foigl,
   wolst gekent doch sajn a schwalb!
   
   
3. Bidne kelblech tut men bindn,
   un men schlept sej un men schecht.
   Wer's hot fligl, flit aroif tsu,
   is bej kejnem nischt kejn knecht
   

Esperanto

1. Sur ^careto ku^sas bovid',
   ku^sas ligata kun ^snur'
   Alten^ciele flugas birdo
   flugas tien kaj reen
   
   
   Ridas vent en grenkampo,
   
   ridas, ridas kaj rid'
   
   ridas suben tagon tutan
   
   kaj nokton duonan pli
   
   
   sinjoro, sinjoro, sinjoro,
   sinjoro, sinjoro, sin,
   sinjoro, sinjoro, sinjoro,
   sinjoro, sinjoro, sin
   
   
2. Krias bovid', diras farmist'
   kiu diris: estu bovid'?
   Volus esti birdo vi,
   volus esti hirundo vi
   
   
3. Stultajn bovidetojn ligas,
   oni tiras ilin, bu^cas
   Kiu flugilhavas, supren!
   ^ce neniu estas servist'

oma^ge al mortigita poeto Itzchak Katsenelson kaj genia novjorka teatromuzikisto Sholom Secunda

Daniel Pfeiffer

---

Greetings to all,

for days the melody of donna, donna, donna has been following me, and I finally got the text from the conference song-booklet of the IJK [Esperanto Youth Congress] en Veszprèm. But that's odd -- why call out to a lady in such a sad son?

So I was seeking what I supposed to be an Italian original. Searching in vain, I found out it was a Jew in the Warsaw Ghetto who had just seen Nazis driving his family away to their deaths -- poor calves! And that (a)donaj means in the Yiddish original "my Lord".

Unfortunately the Esperanto translation follows the English version, which is not entirely faithful in the case of Joan Baez, and yet less so with Donovan. At least "donaj" could have been left as it was, or translated. Not being a poet I have just tried to be as faithful as I could to the original and yet conserve the rhythm. Still, enjoy it, or improve upon it:

Yiddish text

Esperanto text

in homage to the murdered poet Itzchak Katsenelson and the New York musical theater genius Sholom Secunda

Daniel Pfeiffer

Whew! I sure hope I got all the line breaks and stuff in there and that it comes out legible on the screen! I wish I could use tables... ;-(

This is one of those songs that I first learned in Esperanto, then in the Baez version (I've never been into Donovan), and only much later encountered the Yiddish original. I had always assumed that "dona dona" were nonsense syllables like "too-rally-oo-rally", but then I had not been aware of the Holocaust connection, which might make it, to reply to Mark Cohen supra, a "prayer" and not just a "casual song". In the form of Yiddish I'm familiar with the word for "my Lord" that is "Adonai" in transliterated Hebrew is pronounced "adoyne" (accent on the middle syllable), but of course there's plenty of variety in Yiddish dialects, not to mention many Yiddish speakers have always also been Hebrew speakers. So I don't know. I'm not sure that Daniel Pfeiffer is wrong. On the other hand, I doubt it, and so far he hasn't replied to my request for more info on his sources.

Incidentally, the Yiddish text is in Zemerl in a normative YIVO transliteration (along with English and Hebrew versions) but when I try to get it to generate an image file of the Hebrew-alphabet Yiddish text (by clicking on the letter alef) it only does the first two verses and the refrain. Irritating. Oh well.

Liland