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A review by jordan_west
Die schreckliche deutsche Sprache by Mark Twain, Kim Landgraf
4.0
As a student of both English and German studies, reading this book was inevitable for me. So when researching for my thesis paper (a comparison of English and German in terms of which of them sounds worse to the listener - apparently German - and why it does) I found this interesting and hilarious essay.
This is something students of German Studies should definitely read during their studies because it provides a different perspective on our language - especially if German is one's mother tongue.
Nonetheless, I don't agree with everything Twain discusses in his essay. I can see where he is coming from, but most of the time his translations and the critique he bases on them are not quite right. When contrasting the onomatopoeia of English and German words that supposedly describe the same thing, he, for example, translates "storm" as "Gewitter". He then goes on about how the sounds of "Gewitter" do not fit what "storm" describes, completely neglecting that the correct translation would be "Sturm". It does not take a scientist to see that those words are very identical - when it comes to the vowel - and both words perfectly capture and represent the darkness and atmosphere of this whether. This mistake can be found with several of his examples.
Besides, the English language, too, has some words that even I need time to analyze before even remotely being able to understand what the fuck someone wants to say.
Twain also goes completely overboard with "Zug" und "Schlag". His descriptions are completely exaggerated and this is another reason why I cannot give this a 5/5 rating. Yes, I get that it is supposed to be a humorous read (at least to some degree), but the base of his argumentation is just not sufficiently build.
This brings me to my last point: it is no secret that the German language is difficult. I know more than enough native speakers of German who still cannot use the genitive or dative and who cannot see the difference between "das" and "dass". These people have all graduated from school years ago. Twain claims he can properly judge and criticize German after 9 weeks of learning the language, which is complete bullshit.
So this read should not be taken very seriously.
It was still very hilarious and entertaining, though.
This is something students of German Studies should definitely read during their studies because it provides a different perspective on our language - especially if German is one's mother tongue.
Nonetheless, I don't agree with everything Twain discusses in his essay. I can see where he is coming from, but most of the time his translations and the critique he bases on them are not quite right. When contrasting the onomatopoeia of English and German words that supposedly describe the same thing, he, for example, translates "storm" as "Gewitter". He then goes on about how the sounds of "Gewitter" do not fit what "storm" describes, completely neglecting that the correct translation would be "Sturm". It does not take a scientist to see that those words are very identical - when it comes to the vowel - and both words perfectly capture and represent the darkness and atmosphere of this whether. This mistake can be found with several of his examples.
Besides, the English language, too, has some words that even I need time to analyze before even remotely being able to understand what the fuck someone wants to say.
Twain also goes completely overboard with "Zug" und "Schlag". His descriptions are completely exaggerated and this is another reason why I cannot give this a 5/5 rating. Yes, I get that it is supposed to be a humorous read (at least to some degree), but the base of his argumentation is just not sufficiently build.
This brings me to my last point: it is no secret that the German language is difficult. I know more than enough native speakers of German who still cannot use the genitive or dative and who cannot see the difference between "das" and "dass". These people have all graduated from school years ago. Twain claims he can properly judge and criticize German after 9 weeks of learning the language, which is complete bullshit.
So this read should not be taken very seriously.
It was still very hilarious and entertaining, though.