Friday, August 06, 2004

About 5 years ago we changed the spelling rules in german from overly complicated to slightly less complicated. At that time there was a big fuzz about killing the language of Schiller and Goethe and the death of the occidental culture in general. Now one of germanys greates newspaper publishing house announced that they will return to the old spelling, as people are still mixing new and old spelling, and as some books are only published in old spelling, which confuses people.

I right now read a book in the spelling of 1860. I am not confused (let's say not more than normal...). To be on the safe side I think I will return to Lutherian spelling (like back in fourteenhundred something), this will for sure not confuse anybody, as it was Luther who invented german in the first place...

2 comments:

Unknown said...

German satire magazine titanic converts to really, really old spelling, please switch your web-browser to gothic print: http://www.titanic-magazin.de/startseite.php

melissa said...

Interesting. Your post reminds me of the
Simplified Spelling Society-- a small group of Americans who want to change the American English spellings that really don't make much sense. I can see their point, but I really doubt they'll ever get anywhere.