|
 |
Friedrich Engels | ||
Share with:
| ||
 Language Learning Forum : Polyglots |  | |
| Russianbear Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 6557 days ago 358 posts - 422 votes  1 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, Ukrainian Studies: Spanish | Message 1 of 2 25 October 2007 at 11:30am | IP Logged |
|
Friedrich Engels, Karl Marx's collaborator and editor, apparently was a polyglot.
http://www.answers.com/topic/friedrich-engels mentions the following: "He mastered numerous languages, including all the Slavic ones, on which he planned to write a comparative grammar. He also knew Gothic, Old Nordic, and Old Saxon, studied Arabic, and in 3 weeks learned Persian, which he said was "mere child's play." His English, both spoken and written, was impeccable. It was said of him that he "stutters in 20 languages." Edited by Russianbear on 25 October 2007 at 11:31am 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| William Camden Hexaglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6054 days ago 1936 posts - 2333 votes Speaks: English*, German, Spanish, Russian, Turkish, French | Message 2 of 2 25 October 2007 at 3:55pm | IP Logged |
|
At the age of 19 or so, in 1839, Engels wrote a "polyglottic" letter to a friend by the name of Wilhelm Graebe. It was apparently written in a total of nine languages. I saw a page of the letter reproduced in a book about Marx. That page alone was in ancient Greek, Latin, English, French, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese. The other languages were Dutch and, presumably, his native German.
Engels wanted to pursue an academic career, but his father required him to go into the family business. I suspect the letter, and Engels' later study of languages, was an outlet for his frustrations. Marx knew some ancient and modern languages, though he did not have the same polyglot drive as Engels, and his daughters Jenny, Laura and Eleanor were good at languages. Marx certainly learned Russian in later life, and I believe also Ottoman Turkish. Edited by William Camden on 25 October 2007 at 4:04pm 1 person has voted this message useful |
If you wish to post a reply to this topic you must first login. If you are not already registered you must first register
|  | 
Printable version
|
| Copyright 2024 FX Micheloud - All rights reserved No part of this website may be copied by any means without my written authorization. |
