Imports from Germany and Japan

On Tuesday, Dec. 30, the Financial Times ran a column by Frederick Studeman, called "An über language for the Zeitgeist," lamenting the casual use of German words and expressions in the Anglosphere.

[And yes, the column was written by someone named Frederick Studeman. Some sort of clever Teutonic fifth-columnist trying to keep his cover? Hmmmm.]

Anyway, as his headline implies, Studeman is especially unhappy by the prefatory use of über as a substitute for good old English "super." For this he blames Nietzsche. Nobody wants to translate übermensch as "superman" anymore, Shaw notwithstanding, given the Daily-Planetish connotations of the latter term. So the Nietzschean word has been adopted in its Deutsche wholeness into English, and from there the prefix über has detached itself and shown up everywhere.

Yesterday, Jan. 2, there was a very funny letter in the same newspaper telling Mr. Studeman to redirect his worries.

The writer, Satuko Ishikawa, asks whether the German language is really up to the task "of describing the financial tsunami brought on by the Wall Street kamikaze bankers and their ninja subprime mortgage lenders, as the global economy shrinks to the size of a bonsai despite the kabuki drama being played out by central banks unable to find solutions to financial sudoku?"

Good question. I almost feel I should end this post with a haiku or a koan.