I did not intend to imply otherwise and I see now that my rebuke above might suggest something undesirable. I just have too much love for language to be able to appreciate the effectiveness of the automatic translators, which easily destroy any language they try to replicate.
I find it a bit comical to be honest that the language of the culture most people on this site are interested in is not allowed to use. But then again I have always humored over all the people out there collecting documents and books (and other things) they don't even bother to learn how to read...(!)
On the other hand I may just be having a bad day...
- Kenneth
Last edited by KSH; 11-28-2011 at 07:59 PM.
I understand you.
Cheers Andi
Knowledge of German by non Germans is the sine qua non to collect this stuff in an effective manner. It is especially my North American countrymen and -women who ignore this requirement with a kind of insouciance and even arrogance that I find astonishing. In fact, I vowed to learn German fifty years ago after seeing the Longest Day as a nine year old. Now able to see the scenes of this film once more in You Tube with marvelous German actors of the era, the original impulse is as vital. It is also true that many Germans and others cannot write English like Shakespeare or Orwell, but many native English speakers cannot, either.
We live in an age of leveling and so long as people are polite in whatever language they speak and write, they are welcome here.
The riddles in enigmas are far greater when you fail to do the hard work to understand the essentials of language, which opens up vistas of history, culture, art, mentality and so on without which these things are truly just foetid woolens.
Such a thing is welcome here, too, in fact. I find cockney to be very pleasing to the ear, in fact.
It is CNN English, that is, the odd accents I hear only on CNN international to be very irritating.
BBC English is very pleasing to me, since my father was born in London in 1912, but was not British.
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