WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.600 --> 00:00:05.080 Section three of the Awful German Language by Mark Twain. 2 00:00:05.879 --> 00:00:09.640 This LibriVox recording is in the public domain recording by 3 00:00:09.720 --> 00:00:15.519 Kirsten Webber Section three. However, it is not well to 4 00:00:15.599 --> 00:00:19.440 dwell too much on the separable verbs. One is sure 5 00:00:19.519 --> 00:00:22.600 to lose his temper early, and if he sticks to 6 00:00:22.679 --> 00:00:25.879 the subject and will not be warned, it will at 7 00:00:25.960 --> 00:00:31.000 last either soften his brain or petrify it. Personal pronouns 8 00:00:31.000 --> 00:00:34.880 and adjectives are of fruitful nuisance in this language and 9 00:00:35.079 --> 00:00:39.479 should have been left out. For instance, the same sound 10 00:00:39.880 --> 00:00:45.439 Z means you, and it means she, and it means her, 11 00:00:46.039 --> 00:00:48.799 and it means it, and it means they, and it 12 00:00:48.880 --> 00:00:53.719 means them. Think of the ragged poverty of a language 13 00:00:54.039 --> 00:00:56.880 which has to make one word do the work of six, 14 00:00:57.479 --> 00:01:01.000 and a poor little weak thing of only three letters 15 00:01:01.039 --> 00:01:05.760 at that. But mainly think of the exasperation of never 16 00:01:06.000 --> 00:01:09.560 knowing which of these meanings the speaker is trying to convey. 17 00:01:10.560 --> 00:01:14.359 This explains why whenever a person says Z to me, 18 00:01:15.040 --> 00:01:19.400 I generally try to kill him if a stranger now 19 00:01:19.599 --> 00:01:24.680 observe the adjective. Here was a case where simplicity would 20 00:01:24.719 --> 00:01:29.480 have been an advantage. Therefore, for no other reason, the 21 00:01:29.640 --> 00:01:34.280 inventor of this language complicated it all he could. When 22 00:01:34.319 --> 00:01:37.680 we wish to speak of our good friend or friends 23 00:01:38.319 --> 00:01:42.079 in our enlightened tongue, we stick to the one form 24 00:01:42.359 --> 00:01:45.719 and have no trouble or hard feeling about it. But 25 00:01:45.920 --> 00:01:49.439 with the German tongue it is different. When a German 26 00:01:49.560 --> 00:01:53.519 gets his hands on an adjective, he declines it and 27 00:01:53.760 --> 00:01:58.599 keeps on declining it until common sense is all declined 28 00:01:58.640 --> 00:02:03.319 out of. It is as bad as Latin, he says. 29 00:02:03.599 --> 00:02:10.439 For instance, singular nominative mine gutel frendte my good friend, 30 00:02:11.240 --> 00:02:18.360 genitive minez guten frindez of my good friend, dative mine 31 00:02:18.400 --> 00:02:24.319 em guten frinte to my good friend, accusative mine en 32 00:02:24.520 --> 00:02:32.599 guten frente my good friend. Plural nominative mine guten friende 33 00:02:33.240 --> 00:02:39.120 my good friends, genitive minere guten freunde of my good friends, 34 00:02:39.520 --> 00:02:44.280 dative my nen guten frinden to my good friends, accusative 35 00:02:44.639 --> 00:02:50.439 mine gauten friende my good friends. Now let the candidate 36 00:02:50.479 --> 00:02:54.759 for the asylum try to memorize those variations and see 37 00:02:54.800 --> 00:02:58.680 how soon he will be elected. One might better go 38 00:02:58.840 --> 00:03:02.759 without friends in German than take all this trouble about them. 39 00:03:04.400 --> 00:03:07.199 I have shown what a bother it is to decline 40 00:03:07.280 --> 00:03:11.080 a good male friend. Well, this is only a third 41 00:03:11.120 --> 00:03:13.960 of the work, for there is a variety of new 42 00:03:14.039 --> 00:03:17.639 distortions of the adjective to be learned when the object 43 00:03:17.759 --> 00:03:21.520 is feminine, and still another when the object is newter. 44 00:03:22.439 --> 00:03:25.840 Now there are more adjectives in this language than there 45 00:03:25.840 --> 00:03:30.039 are black cats in Switzerland, and they must all be 46 00:03:30.360 --> 00:03:36.960 as elaborately declined as the examples above suggest. Difficult troublesome, 47 00:03:37.599 --> 00:03:42.400 these words cannot describe it. I heard a Californian student 48 00:03:42.599 --> 00:03:46.919 in Heidelberg say, in one of his calmest moods, that 49 00:03:46.960 --> 00:03:51.280 he would rather decline two drinks than one German adjective. 50 00:03:52.879 --> 00:03:55.879 The inventor of the language seems to have taken pleasure 51 00:03:56.080 --> 00:04:00.000 in complicating it in every way he could think. For instance, 52 00:04:00.919 --> 00:04:04.680 if one is casually referring to a house a house, 53 00:04:05.199 --> 00:04:10.800 or a horse felt or a dog hunt, he spells 54 00:04:10.840 --> 00:04:14.560 these words as I have indicated. But if he is 55 00:04:14.639 --> 00:04:18.079 referring to them in the dative case, he sticks on 56 00:04:18.279 --> 00:04:22.879 a foolish and unnecessary E and spells them how z 57 00:04:23.480 --> 00:04:29.240 fell d hunbu so as An added e often signifies 58 00:04:29.279 --> 00:04:32.839 the plural as the s does with us. The new 59 00:04:32.879 --> 00:04:35.839 student is likely to go on for a month making 60 00:04:35.959 --> 00:04:40.079 twins out of a dative dog before he discovers his mistake. 61 00:04:41.160 --> 00:04:44.279 And on the other hand, many a new student who 62 00:04:44.319 --> 00:04:47.600 could ill a Ford loss has bought and paid for 63 00:04:47.680 --> 00:04:50.639 two dogs and only got one of them because he 64 00:04:50.879 --> 00:04:54.720 ignorantly bought that dog in the dative singular when he 65 00:04:54.800 --> 00:04:58.560 really supposed he was talking plural, which left the law 66 00:04:58.800 --> 00:05:02.000 on the seller's side. Of course, by the strict rules 67 00:05:02.000 --> 00:05:06.920 of grammar, and therefore a suit for recovery could not lie. 68 00:05:08.040 --> 00:05:11.720 In German, all the nouns begin with a capital letter. 69 00:05:12.480 --> 00:05:15.839 Now that is a good idea, and a good idea 70 00:05:16.040 --> 00:05:21.720 in this language is necessarily conspicuous from its lonesomeness. I 71 00:05:21.800 --> 00:05:25.800 consider this capitalizing of nouns a good idea because by 72 00:05:25.879 --> 00:05:28.839 reason of it, you are almost always able to tell 73 00:05:28.879 --> 00:05:32.240 a noun the minute you see it. You fall into 74 00:05:32.399 --> 00:05:36.120 error occasionally because you mistake the name of a person 75 00:05:36.279 --> 00:05:38.800 for the name of a thing and waste a good 76 00:05:38.839 --> 00:05:41.199 deal of time trying to dig a meaning out of it. 77 00:05:41.720 --> 00:05:45.879 German names almost always do mean something, and this helps 78 00:05:45.920 --> 00:05:50.040 to deceive the student. I translated a passage one day 79 00:05:50.079 --> 00:05:55.560 which said that quote the infuriated Tigris broke loose and 80 00:05:55.839 --> 00:06:03.480 utterly ate up the unfortunate fir forest Tannenwald. When I 81 00:06:03.639 --> 00:06:06.879 was girding up my loins to doubt this, I found 82 00:06:06.920 --> 00:06:11.079 out that Tannenwald in this instance was a man's name. 83 00:06:13.680 --> 00:06:17.759 Every noun has a gender, and there is no sense 84 00:06:17.920 --> 00:06:21.639 or system in the distribution. So the gender of each 85 00:06:21.800 --> 00:06:25.399 must be learned separately and by heart. There is no 86 00:06:25.600 --> 00:06:29.759 other way to do this. One has to have a memory, 87 00:06:30.000 --> 00:06:34.319 like a memorandum book. In German, a young lady has 88 00:06:34.439 --> 00:06:39.160 no sex, while a turnip has. Think what over wrought 89 00:06:39.399 --> 00:06:43.879 reverence that shows for the turnip, and what callous disrespect 90 00:06:44.000 --> 00:06:47.519 for the girl? See how it looks in print. I 91 00:06:47.680 --> 00:06:51.000 translate this from a conversation in one of the best 92 00:06:51.439 --> 00:06:59.399 German Sunday school books. Quote, Greetienne Villhem, where is the 93 00:06:59.439 --> 00:07:07.120 turnip villem She has gone to the kitchen, Greetien, Where 94 00:07:07.240 --> 00:07:13.079 is the accomplished and beautiful English maiden Vinhem? It has 95 00:07:13.199 --> 00:07:20.279 gone to the opera. End To continue with the German genders, 96 00:07:20.800 --> 00:07:25.439 a tree is male, its buds are female, its leaves 97 00:07:25.600 --> 00:07:31.439 are neuter. Horses are sexless, dogs are male, Cats are 98 00:07:31.560 --> 00:07:39.720 female tomcats included. Of course. A person's mouth, neck, bosom, elbows, fingers, nail's, feet, 99 00:07:39.839 --> 00:07:43.720 and body are of the male sex, and his head 100 00:07:43.839 --> 00:07:47.480 is male or neuter, according to the word selected to 101 00:07:47.639 --> 00:07:50.920 signify it, and not according to the sex of the 102 00:07:51.000 --> 00:07:55.000 individual who wears it. For in Germany all the women 103 00:07:55.079 --> 00:08:02.480 wear either male heads or sexless ones. A person's nose, lips, shoulders, breast, hands, 104 00:08:02.519 --> 00:08:09.160 and toes are of the female sex, and his hair, ears, eyes, chin, legs, knees, heart, 105 00:08:09.279 --> 00:08:14.240 and conscience haven't any sex at all. The inventor of 106 00:08:14.279 --> 00:08:17.279 the language probably got what he knew about a conscience 107 00:08:17.480 --> 00:08:22.959 from hearsay. Now by the above dissection, the reader will 108 00:08:23.000 --> 00:08:25.720 see that in Germany a man may think he is 109 00:08:25.759 --> 00:08:28.439 a man, but when he comes to look into the 110 00:08:28.480 --> 00:08:31.879 matter more closely, he is bound to have his doubts. 111 00:08:32.639 --> 00:08:35.720 He finds that, in sober truth, he is a most 112 00:08:35.840 --> 00:08:40.440 ridiculous mixture. If he ends by trying to comfort himself 113 00:08:40.480 --> 00:08:43.159 with the thought that he can at least depend on 114 00:08:43.320 --> 00:08:47.440 a third of this mess as being manly and masculine, 115 00:08:48.080 --> 00:08:51.720 the humiliating second thought will quickly remind him that in 116 00:08:51.799 --> 00:08:55.279 this respect he is no better off than any woman. 117 00:08:55.639 --> 00:09:00.320 Or cow in the land. In the German, it is 118 00:09:00.360 --> 00:09:03.840 true that, by some oversight of the inventor of the language, 119 00:09:03.960 --> 00:09:08.919 a woman is female, but a wife vibe is not, 120 00:09:09.799 --> 00:09:15.039 which is unfortunate. A wife here has no sex, she 121 00:09:15.200 --> 00:09:19.840 is neuter. So according to the grammar, a fish is he, 122 00:09:20.600 --> 00:09:24.960 his scales are she, but a fish wife is neither. 123 00:09:26.159 --> 00:09:30.600 To describe a wife as sexless may be called under description. 124 00:09:31.559 --> 00:09:35.720 That is bad enough, but over description is surely worse. 125 00:09:36.320 --> 00:09:41.399 A German speaks of an Englishman as the englandah to 126 00:09:41.559 --> 00:09:44.840 change the sex, he adds in and that stands for 127 00:09:44.919 --> 00:09:50.840 english woman englendahl in. That seems descriptive enough, but still 128 00:09:50.919 --> 00:09:54.200 it is not exact enough for a German. So he 129 00:09:54.320 --> 00:09:57.960 precedes the word with that article, which indicates that the 130 00:09:58.000 --> 00:10:02.519 creature to follow is femminine, and writes it down thus 131 00:10:03.000 --> 00:10:09.559 quote d engleandelynn end quote, which means quote the she 132 00:10:10.279 --> 00:10:18.320 englishwoman end quote. I consider that that person is over described. Well. 133 00:10:19.080 --> 00:10:21.679 After the student has learned the sex of a great 134 00:10:21.879 --> 00:10:25.759 number of nouns, he is still in a difficulty because 135 00:10:25.759 --> 00:10:29.120 he finds it impossible to persuade his tongue to refer 136 00:10:29.240 --> 00:10:32.360 to things as he and she and him and her, 137 00:10:32.960 --> 00:10:36.519 which it has always been accustomed to refer to as it. 138 00:10:37.759 --> 00:10:41.159 When he even frames a German sentence in his mind, 139 00:10:41.360 --> 00:10:44.519 with the hymns and hers in the right places, and 140 00:10:44.519 --> 00:10:47.960 then works up his courage to the utterance point, it 141 00:10:48.120 --> 00:10:51.679 is no use. The moment he begins to speak, his 142 00:10:51.960 --> 00:10:55.440 tongue flies the track, and all those labored males and 143 00:10:55.559 --> 00:10:59.639 females come out as it's. And even when he is 144 00:10:59.679 --> 00:11:03.480 reading German to himself, he always calls those things it, 145 00:11:04.240 --> 00:11:10.879 whereas he ought to read it this way. Tale of 146 00:11:11.080 --> 00:11:18.519 the Fishwife and its sad fate footnote two. I capitalize 147 00:11:18.559 --> 00:11:22.960 the nouns in the German and ancient English fashion. End 148 00:11:23.120 --> 00:11:29.039 of footnote two. It is a bleak day. Hear the 149 00:11:29.159 --> 00:11:33.120 rain how he pours, and the hail, how he rattles, 150 00:11:33.720 --> 00:11:37.279 And see the snow how he drifts along, and of 151 00:11:37.360 --> 00:11:42.320 the mud, how deep he is. Ah the poor fishwife. 152 00:11:42.879 --> 00:11:47.279 It is stuck fast in the mire. It has dropped 153 00:11:47.320 --> 00:11:51.200 its basket of fishes, and its hands have been cut 154 00:11:51.360 --> 00:11:55.399 by the scales as it seizes some of the falling creatures. 155 00:11:56.120 --> 00:12:00.159 And one scale has even gotten into its eye, and 156 00:12:00.360 --> 00:12:04.679 it cannot get her out. It opens its mouth to 157 00:12:04.759 --> 00:12:08.559 cry for help, But if any sound comes out of him, 158 00:12:09.399 --> 00:12:13.279 alas he is drowned by the raging of the storm. 159 00:12:13.600 --> 00:12:16.960 And now a tom cat has got one of the fishes, 160 00:12:17.080 --> 00:12:22.360 and she will surely escape with him. No, she bites 161 00:12:22.399 --> 00:12:26.159 off a fin, she holds her in her mouth. Will 162 00:12:26.240 --> 00:12:32.080 she swallow her? No? The fishwife's brave mother dog deserts 163 00:12:32.279 --> 00:12:37.320 his puppies and rescues the fin, which he eats himself 164 00:12:37.480 --> 00:12:42.759 as his reward. Oh horror, the lightning has struck the 165 00:12:42.840 --> 00:12:47.440 fish basket. He sets him on fire. See the flame. 166 00:12:47.679 --> 00:12:51.519 How she licks the doomed utensil with her red and 167 00:12:51.799 --> 00:12:56.960 angry tongue. Now she attacks the helpless fishwife's foot. She 168 00:12:57.120 --> 00:13:01.480 burns him up all but the big toe, and even 169 00:13:01.639 --> 00:13:06.720 she is partly consumed. And still she spreads. Still she 170 00:13:06.960 --> 00:13:11.480 waves her fiery tongues. She attacks the fishwife's leg and 171 00:13:11.679 --> 00:13:17.159 destroys it. She attacks its hand and destroys her. She 172 00:13:17.360 --> 00:13:22.600 attacks the fishwife's leg and destroys her. Also, she attacks 173 00:13:22.639 --> 00:13:27.919 its body and consumes him. She reads herself about its heart, 174 00:13:28.159 --> 00:13:33.039 and it is consumed. Next about its breast, and in 175 00:13:33.120 --> 00:13:37.200 a moment she is a cinder. Now she reaches its 176 00:13:37.279 --> 00:13:42.200 neck he goes now its chin, It goes now its nose. 177 00:13:42.519 --> 00:13:48.639 She goes in another moment, except help come, the fishwife 178 00:13:48.799 --> 00:13:53.559 will be no more time presses, Is there none to 179 00:13:53.799 --> 00:13:59.440 sucker and save? Yes? Joy, Joy, with flying feet, the 180 00:13:59.600 --> 00:14:05.919 she englishwoman comes, But alas the generous she female is 181 00:14:06.000 --> 00:14:10.840 too late. Where now is the fated fishwife? It has 182 00:14:10.960 --> 00:14:15.120 ceased from its sufferings, It has gone to a better land. 183 00:14:15.759 --> 00:14:18.759 All that is left of it for its loved ones 184 00:14:18.799 --> 00:14:24.120 to lament over is this poor smoldering ash heap, Ah, 185 00:14:24.360 --> 00:14:29.480 woful woeful ash heap. Let us take him up tenderly, 186 00:14:29.840 --> 00:14:34.159 reverently upon the lowly shovel, and bear him to his 187 00:14:34.320 --> 00:14:38.440 long rest, with the prayer that when he rises again, 188 00:14:38.720 --> 00:14:43.399 it will be a realm where he will have one good, square, 189 00:14:43.600 --> 00:14:48.200 responsible sex and have it all to himself, instead of 190 00:14:48.240 --> 00:14:52.360 having a mangy lot of assorted sexes scattered all over 191 00:14:52.480 --> 00:14:58.120 him in spots. There. Now the reader can see for 192 00:14:58.240 --> 00:15:02.799 himself that this pronoun business is a very awkward thing 193 00:15:02.919 --> 00:15:07.720 for the unaccustomed tongue. I suppose that in all languages, 194 00:15:07.840 --> 00:15:11.480 the similarities of look and sound between words which have 195 00:15:11.679 --> 00:15:16.399 no similarity in meaning, are a fruitful source of perplexity 196 00:15:16.519 --> 00:15:20.360 to the foreigner. It is so in our tongue, and 197 00:15:20.519 --> 00:15:24.440 it is notably the case in the German. Now there 198 00:15:24.559 --> 00:15:29.000 is that troublesome word famelt. To me, it has so 199 00:15:29.159 --> 00:15:33.440 close a resemblance, either real or fancied, to three or 200 00:15:33.480 --> 00:15:40.360 four other words, that I never know whether it means despised, painted, suspected, 201 00:15:40.960 --> 00:15:44.360 or married until I look in the dictionary, and then 202 00:15:44.399 --> 00:15:47.799 I find it means the latter. There are lots of 203 00:15:47.879 --> 00:15:52.960 such words, and they are a great torment to increase 204 00:15:53.000 --> 00:15:56.799 the difficulty. There are words which seem to resemble each 205 00:15:56.840 --> 00:16:00.279 other and yet do not, but they make just as 206 00:16:00.360 --> 00:16:04.200 much trouble as if they did. For instance, there is 207 00:16:04.279 --> 00:16:09.440 the word thahmetan to let, to lease, to hire, and 208 00:16:09.679 --> 00:16:14.799 the word phahiratten another way of saying to marry. I 209 00:16:14.840 --> 00:16:18.039 heard of an Englishman who knocked at a man's door 210 00:16:18.120 --> 00:16:22.080 in Heidelberg and proposed, in the best German he could command, 211 00:16:22.240 --> 00:16:28.799 to quote pha hiraten end quote that house. Then there 212 00:16:28.840 --> 00:16:32.039 are some words which mean one thing when you emphasize 213 00:16:32.039 --> 00:16:35.799 the first syllable, but mean something very different if you 214 00:16:35.879 --> 00:16:40.200 throw the emphasis on the last syllable. For instance, there 215 00:16:40.279 --> 00:16:44.000 is a word which means a runaway or the act 216 00:16:44.039 --> 00:16:47.519 of glancing through a book, according to the placing of 217 00:16:47.559 --> 00:16:52.559 the emphasis, and another word which signifies to associate with 218 00:16:52.639 --> 00:16:56.559 a man or to avoid him, according to where you 219 00:16:56.639 --> 00:17:00.799 put the emphasis, and you can generally depend on putting 220 00:17:00.799 --> 00:17:05.440 it in the wrong place and getting into trouble. End 221 00:17:05.759 --> 00:17:09.160 of Section three.