"Melody's"

c . o . l . u . m . n

  ........  Do you know ???

Is the German language really awful?   

A person who has not studied German can form no idea of what a perplexing language it is. Every noun has a gender, and there is no sense or system in the distribution. So the gender of each must be learned separately and by heart. There is no other way. To do this one has to have a memory like a memorandum book. In German a young lady has no sex, while a turnip has. Think what reverence that shows for the turnip, and what disrespect for the girl. See how it looks in print. I translate this from a conversation in one of the best of the German Sunday-school books :

Gretchen: “Wilhelm, where is the turnip?”
Wilhelm: “She has gone to the kitchen.”
Gretchen: “Where is the beautiful English maiden?”
Wilhelm: “It has gone to the opera.”

The Germans have a kind of parenthesis, which they make by splitting a verb in two and putting half of it at the beginning of an exciting chapter and the other half at the end of it. Can any one conceive of anything more confusing than that? These things are called ‘separable verbs’. The German grammar is blistered all over with separable verbs; and the wider the two portions of one of them are spread apart, the better the author of the crime is pleased with his performance. A favourite  one is reiste ab, which means departed.

Some German words are so long that they have a perspective. Observe these examples:

Generalstaatsverordnetenversammlungen
Altertumswissenschaften
Kinderaufbewahrungsanstalten
Unabhängigkeitserklärungen
Wiederherstellungsbestrebungen
Waffenstillstandsunterhandlungen

These things are not words, they are alphabetical processions. And they are not rare; one can open a German newspaper any time and see them marching majestically across the page,  and if he has any imagination he can see the banners and hear the music, too. They impart a martial thrill to the meekest subject. I take a great interest is these curiosities. Whenever I come across a good one, I stuff it and put it in my museum. In this way I have made quite a valuable collection. When I get duplicates, I exchange with other collectors, and thus increase the variety of my stock.

From A Tramp Abroad by Mark Twain