The Hi, I'm Peter Adamson, and you're listening to the History of Philosophy Podcast, brought to you with the support of the Philosophy Department at King's College London and the LMU in Munich.

Online at www. History of Philosophy.net.

Today's episode. What do you think?

Aukum on mental language.

It's a good thing that I didn't read Mark Twain's essay

The Awful German Language before learning German myself, otherwise I probably

wouldn't have bothered to try.

He laments the German habit of building extremely long compound words, like Gerelal-States-Din-Fasamlungen and the use of grammatical case endings.

When a German gets his hands on an adjective, he declines it and keeps on declining it until the common sense is all declined out of it.

Then there is Twain's criticism of German nouns.

As he says, every noun is either masculine, feminine, or neuter, and this has to be learned by heart since the genders seem to have been assigned more or less at random.

Twain remarks,

In German, a young lady, Das Meedin, has no sex while a turnip, de rube has.

Think what overwrought reference that shows for the turnip and what callous 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 accomplished and beautiful English maiden?

Wilhelm, it has gone to the opera. I'm with Twain on this. When I speak German I can just about bring myself to refer to knife, spoon and fork as it he and she,

whether this is more revealing of German attitudes. pork as it, it, he and she.

...