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Miranda Cooper (מירעלע)
@adina_chava
creative writing MFA student / editor / fiction reviewer / words on words , , etc /
Miranda Cooper (מירעלע)’s Tweets
Thrilled to have my translation of one of my all time favorite Yiddish poems, Aaron Zeitlin’s Six Lines, in the beautiful spring issue of !
this reminds me of my favorite graffiti in a coffeeshop: “and you thought God left you. Chin up, stupid”
helloooooooo two years ago I was climbing out from under the rubble of my life and today I was accepted to an MFA program in fiction :)
9/11 was a hugely traumatic tragedy for many New Yorkers and the Islamophobia in the aftermath was a hugely traumatic tragedy for many other New Yorkers. it’s not an either/or thing. this is not that complicated
just over here asking for hashem’s forgiveness as I make a bowl of oatmeal with oat milk, ie violating exodus 23:19
All I can think of in the wake of the synagogue shooting in San Diego are these words from the wonderful :
“At the trial of God, we will ask: why did you allow all this?
And the answer will be an echo: why did you allow all this?”
getting four MFA acceptances like “this must be a mistake... another mistake... yep, mistake”
come next door, over here there are all those things AND an abortion ban
This older Jewish woman sat down near me outside at Breads (they have heat lamps!) and started reading aloud to me, unbidden, from the NYT in increasingly enraged tones. She then proceeded to tell me about her endoscopy, her work as a psychoanalyst, etc. I have a new best friend.
oh hey! my translation of Aaron Zeitlin's flooring "Six Lines" is now not just in the Spring issue but up on the website! check it out
we yiddishists have been waiting for autonomous zone discourse twitter forever. its arrival is like the arrival of moshiach and it was not on my covid bingo card
Thrilled to share that this fall I’ll be starting a creative writing MFA at ’s . I was lucky (and truly shocked) to have several great options, and choosing was not easy, but the amazing faculty and the program’s ethos tipped the scales. Southampton here I come!
it took six years and quite a roundabout route but today I start an MFA in creative writing. happy 22nd grade to me 😊
Spoke #Yiddish to the first person I saw at the launch party and got a huge Yiddish communist poster so I’d say this event is a success #unionpool #unionjews #jewishleft
Lol okay no need to be nasty—I just did that, though, and it’s not at all clear what you’re referring to. “We need ICE to focus on real threats”?
convincing myself that watching shtisel is necessary for my "career" as a "yiddishist" and as a freelance "american jewish culture writer"
true but I don’t think anyone should engage in misinformation, even if I’d much rather a leftist agenda be doing that any other alternative haha. point taken re:”this is Twitter” lol. you obviously have good viewpoints, just trying to check myself against the rage retweet impulse
I spoke to Nicole Krauss, one of my all-time favorite living fiction writers, about her new collection, her non-allusion to Isaac Bashevis Singer’s wife, Conor Oberst, and feeling more at home in the parallel world of literature than in this one. heyalma.com/nicole-krauss-
Beyond excited that has named Maud Mandel, a historian and Judaic studies scholar, as its new President--making her the first woman to hold that position! It's a powerful affirmation to feel represented by the institution I love so much. president.williams.edu/welcome-our-ne
I am a Jew who grew up in Pittsburgh; I went to a bat mitzvah or two at Tree of Life. I walked by it a couple times every week. My heart is broken.
thanks! truly wasn’t trying to put you on the defensive—just wanted to verify before kneejerk liking/retweeting. totally agree re “real threats”—at the very least, it leaves her lots of room to flip flop—but ”we need ICE” isn’t really a fair representation of what she said...
All the best Jewish lady twitter mavens have said what I wanted to say re: the awful @CareyPurcell piece, but I’d just like to add: the idea that we haven’t already thought of trendy cocktails that serve as commentary on American Jewish life is really insulting
officially finished with year one of my MFA. I’m very proud of this accomplishment not because I think my writing has improved a ton or I’ve made lots of progress on my novel, but because this year I fought almost the worst mental & physical health problems I’ve yet encountered.
It took Robin Williams’. It took David Foster Wallace’s. It took Virginia Woolf’s. It nearly took mine. This spring & summer I’ve been healthy & at baseline for the first time in years. Most importantly, I’m alive. And I’m going to fight like hell to make people understand. (5/5)
bought myself a pretty personalized ex libris stamp, that’s how all the girls get through breakups right
Just heard someone SCREAM “the Talmud is NOT Jane Austen” from the hotel room a few doors down from mine and this is why I have loved #AJS17
the yeshivish is bad article is prescriptive, farshtunken drek and every frum khaver I’ve spoken to about it is maskim. like I’m a veltlekher and if I’m staying by you for shabbes I’m perfectly capable of dealing with your unique lingo because that’s what culture... is. farshtey?
why does no one talk about how hatikvah is the same tune as I’m a little teapot but in a minor key
Today, Kanye appears to be having a manic episode on the public stage, and people are laughing. Today would have been the birthday of my all-time favorite actor, Robin Williams, had he not died by suicide as a result of bipolar. (1/5)
Yo! Semites!
The has kindly selected one of my translations to publish for the month of August—a creepy, atmospheric short story by my fav Sarah Hamer-Jacklyn, ft. everyone’s favorite historic Jewish folk ritual: a plague wedding!
at dropping off my mother for her first day of Yiddish, is this what it’s like for parents taking their kids to kindergarten? #emotions #idontwannaleave
The great Yiddish writer Moyshe Kulbak z”l was murdered 80 years ago today in Stalin’s purges. Honor his life by reading his work.
just got my first ever lit mag acceptance (not counting various lit mags, which I am of course very grateful to) for an original (non-translated) work!! 🥺🥺🥺
I have a new project, it’s called normalize drinking wine and reading a novel alone in a fancy restaurant late at night 2019!!
just had a short story I wrote SEVEN YEARS AGO, and have been revising and submitting ever since, accepted by a lit mag. my first real fiction acceptance! don’t stop submitting 💜
I forgot to tweet a “one year ago” thing. So. Last summer, I told the scary truth to the Internet. If it helped even one person avoid what I went through, dayenu. Here’s to a year of not just surviving but thriving despite (& because of?) my nutty brain.
Tsvey Brider and Baymele put on a wonderful show tonight in Brooklyn. It was so lovely to see them again after four years, and to be in a room full of excited Yiddishists. is a magnificent performer!
One of the greatest tragedies of North American Jewish culture is that when people hear the song “Hallelujah,” they think of Shrek
Because of this thread, asked me if I would write a real thing, not just tweets, on this subject for . So... here it is. It is terrifying for me to say some of this stuff on the internet. And it’s important. heyalma.com/we-need-to-des
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Today, Kanye appears to be having a manic episode on the public stage, and people are laughing. Today would have been the birthday of my all-time favorite actor, Robin Williams, had he not died by suicide as a result of bipolar. (1/5)
This shabbos I decorated my two fav totes with pins and I’m v proud
CW: depression
Two years ago I began ECT treatments for severe, psychotic bipolar depression. Yesterday, my therapist described me as “thriving”. Over the past two years I’ve overcome heartbreak, made leaps in my career, begun writing a novel, and remembered how to love myself.
Motion to retire the use of “oy vey” or any cutesy pun versions thereof in headlines about contemporary Yiddish culture. Believe it or not, Yiddish is a robust language that is not reducible to one caricatured expression!
accidentally started a transliteration argument on an thread by writing the word rosheshone. Experts were called in ( ). Tears were shed (I imagine). Living my best life / it’s been a good day
Cannot sum up in a tweet my feelings about the brilliant, infuriating, problematic, quintessential Jewish American writer without whom the Jewish literary landscape, American literary landscape, & my own intellectual landscape, would never have been the same. Zikhroyne livrokhe.
Thrilled to have my translation of Morris Winchevsky’s “Jargon” included in ’s “Radiant Jargon: Six Poems About Yiddish”!
There should be a lifecycle event for when Jewish women realize they're now older than the camp counselors they were once infatuated with
So many fail to understand that this is a truly lethal disease. So many fail to understand that it is not a character flaw, that many kind, thoughtful, brilliant & talented people suffer from it (indeed, there is a studied link between bipolar and creativity/genius). (3/5)
i wore three hamsa necklaces under my sweater during the final for my first ever yiddish class, and clutched them throughout for support. now I am keynahore an editor at and a published yiddish translator. b”h
very VERY proud of this Nutella challah — wishing everyone a zis yor (a sweet new year)
my mom to a lady on Facebook arguing that bail funds “let criminals and rioters go free, and they end up in your backyard”: “the dry cleaner called, your white hood is ready”
For the last class of one of my MFA courses we had to write about our classmates’ work. Someone, reading theirs on mine, said “I didn’t used to think that Jewishness & mental illness were related” and the three Jews in the class including prof immediately burst out laughing
Today I, a person whose type 1 bipolar disorder came extremely close to robbing me of my life on more than one occasion—during both severe mania and severe depression—am thinking about our collective failures of empathy. (2/5)
#NewProfilePic ... felt like this (candid) face was a pretty good summation of how I feel about most things on Twitter
Almost just broke my ankle on west 4th (don’t wear 5 year old worn out birks in the rain I guess) but was saved by some lesbians and an elder gay man (who they’d just met but was shepherding them to some rosé). this is my Why I’m Never Leaving New York essay
happy birthday to ME— just published two never before translated Chelm stories by Isaac Bashevis Singer! these are good, folks, you want to read them.
2018 was a very hard year for me—dealing with health problems including a hospitalization and a new diagnosis, I did not write as much as I would have liked, particularly in the second half of the year. But to celebrate what I did publish, a thread of stuff I wrote this year:
told my friend Rose about how my Brooklyn Jewish grandfather worked at the original Nathan’s stand on Coney Island and she said I had hot dog yichus
oh hey I guess this thing I wrote now exists on the internet too
Have fully become the type of (((person))) who asks at coffeeshops where they get their bagels from
i too made fun of the shtettl brand but what is most upsetting is how many Jews on twitter seem to think “shtetl” is some kind of synonym for “ghetto”.........?
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- The Twenty-Seventh Man, Nathan Englander
- Recitatif, Toni Morrison
- Etta or Bessie or Dora or Rose, Elisa Albert
- The School, Donald Barthelme
- The Bath, Raymond Carver
- The Lottery, Shirley Jackson
- Babylon Revisited, Fitzgerald
- Emergency, Denis Johnson
I love, love, love בל״ם. So brilliantly simple, but does so much: practically just an expedient, perhaps, but also a powerful assertion via language that to say “Black Lives Matter” has the power of prayer. A sheynem dank, thank you, for all your work on this.
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Amid an eruption of protests over police brutality, @mordkhetzvi reflects on the experience of translating the phrase "Black Lives Matter" into Yiddish. jewishcurrents.org/translating-bl
boyfriend wants to learn yiddish and I have begun teaching him very basic stuff......... if I get him In eynem for Chanukah so I can teach him from it is that selfish of me 😅
at the Hungarian pastry shop for the first time since COVID began and apparently they now take credit cards and you pay when you order, rather than after sitting there with your one Viennese coffee for four hours. absolutely unacceptable
one of my favorite (completely earnestly) parts of publishing something I’m proud of is having a bunch of my old middle and high school teachers come out of the woodwork to comment on my mom’s Facebook page how proud they are of me
excited for Larry David to get paid thousands of dollars to sit grumpily in a chair on this weekend
sorry to all my various therapists and psychiatrists but the key to my mental health seems to be going to the farm stand to carefully select one (1) heirloom tomato, and nothing else, each day
did it hurt? when you attended a selective liberal arts college an an idyllic corner of New England
I’m alive today—and happy—because I got serious professional help. If you think you need help, don’t be afraid to seek it. Let others help you get help.
Two years ago I was incapable of joy and sure that I’d be better off dead. I was wrong.
It’s never the answer.
Please stay.
So many fail to understand that our failure to understand, our failure to talk about it and recognize it & treat it adequately—which is a direct result of our failure to accept it and normalize talking about it—has taken too many lives. (4/5)
hello yes I just spoke to my favorite living writer on the phone, no I am not okay
As I begin my third (?!) year at , I’m thrilled to be taking on the job of editing nonacademic reviews: book-length translations, music, virtual performance art maybe? Whatever new Yiddish culture is created in these strange times, I want to read your writing about it!
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Replying to @ingeveb
Barukh habo (welcome) to two new members of our editorial team: @sandy__fox, our new Peer Review Editor, and @SChiritescu, our new Pedagogy Editor! @adina_chava, previously our Communications Editor, will be taking on the role of Assistant Editor. We’re excited for a great 5781!
khevre? was Yiddish twitter always this fun or is that like just in 2018
Very excited to share this interview with ~my friend the Pulitzer finalist~ , in which he and I discuss his new song cycle of Yiddish poems set to music, “in a dark blue night,” for ’s Berru Poetry Series.
at Trader Joe’s, impulse buying 4 bouquets to brighten up my own damn apartment for this lonely week, muttering “Mrs. Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself”
my psychiatrist: how are things?
me, A Bipolar: ~just another manic monday~
my psychiatrist: uhhhhhh
me: wish it was sunday
my psychiatrist: ...
me: cause that’s my fun day
well today was supposed to be a productive day for me and then there was an attempted coup, so, you know, having a normal one in the good old us of a
hello! I am a “””””””writer”””””” who is interested in “Jewishness” in “America” and I have only seen four episodes of Seinfeld. Imposter syndrome is real and it’s okay to have it 🥕
it’s #NationalComingOutDay and although I’m pretty sure y’all know this, I realized I’ve never done it and visibility is always good, so here it is: I’m bi, and I always have been 😘
I am literally a Jewish studies student and yet whenever someone mentions Samson I just get the Regina Spektor song stuck in my head
my most toxic trait is that when I find out literary novelists “live in williamstown, MA” I cannot rest until I figure out what professor they are married to
I know it feels like we already live in Chelm, but I promise these stories are still a good escape!
A zisn Pesekh, friends. Here’s some handwritten music of a Yiddish Miriam’s Song, from a hagode published by the @workmenscircle 70 years ago. May we all commit in earnest to bringing about liberation for all people. #Passover
UPDATE:
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Replying to @adina_chava
now I got an ex AND an ex libris