Tuesday, June 03, 2014
Of Pochemuchkas and Shlimazls
The other day I ran across an article that reported the results of a survey of 1000 professional interpreters and translators, asking them their opinions of the world's most difficult-to-translate words. I won't bore you with the entire top ten, but I thought that two of them were worth sharing.
In Russian, a pochemuchka is "a person who asks lots of questions." It derives from the word pochemu, which means why ... hence, a pochemuchka is literally a "why-person." Those of you who are parents and grandparents will probably enjoy knowing that there's a specific word for the toddler who asks why? a million times per day.
The elegant word shlimazl is actually one I've heard before - it's a Yiddish word that refers to a person who is chronically unlucky ... a born loser. It's similar to another wonderful Yiddish word - shlemiel - which indicates a person who is an unlucky bungler or a chump. It's been said that the shlemiel is a person who always spills his soup, while the shlimazl is the person he spills it on.
No special message today ... just sharing a couple of really clever words that you can throw into your discourse to look erudite. Or sound like a shlemiel. Whatever.
Have a good day. More thoughts tomorrow.
Bilbo
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7 comments:
The first word is one we should have an English equivalent to.
There should be an opposite to pochemuchka -- one who doesn't ask questions when they ought to be asked.
But why are there not more words like that?
Angel - here's your chance: what would be a good word for that person? Leave a comment or e-mail me and let me know your suggestion.
Heidi - because!
Discourse, that's a NASCAR word isn't it?
I like the shlimazel concept.
Hello, Juliette! You seem to be a first-time visitor ... hope to see you back here again more often!
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