Letters - 06 June 2014
From language to conscientious objection
Tua’r Tarddiad
Gerald Hewitson’s piece about the cultural and emotional differences in tone and meaning between two languages (30 May) must have rung bells for many Friends struggling to express themselves in more than simply their mother tongue.
Swiss German was spoken in my family, but we lived in the French part of Switzerland; when I started kindergarten, I quickly adjusted to my new friends and learned to chatter in French. I do not remember being aware then of any conflict, but when, aged thirteen, we moved to Zurich, where Swiss German was the common dialect and German the official language, it was like a homecoming for me. Some years later I was given as essay topic ‘changer de langue c’est changer de climat spirituel’ (to change language is to change one’s spiritual climate). I felt I had plenty to say about it!
While feeling rather stressed and exhausted, the words on occasion have come to me: ‘God, just catch me’. Gerald’s article made me wonder how this would translate. While in German fang mich has to me something intrusive and the French attrappe moi even more so – it can sound violent even – the English version conjures up an image of some parent preventing a child’s fall or embracing it as it jumps from a wall. I rather like the English language!
Sonja Rose
First world war
I have become increasingly concerned at Friends’ activities commemorating the first world war.
To commemorate, according to the New Shorter Oxford Dictionary, is to ‘mention as worthy of remembrance; celebrate in speech or writing’ and to ‘preserve in memory by some solemnity of celebration’.
I find myself in sympathy with Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, the former president of France, who expressed, in the Financial Times on 24 May 2014, in my view, a much more Quaker-like position: ‘What is there to commemorate? It was a war with no purpose that ended in an abominable massacre. I won’t commemorate it. I will reflect, remember, but not commemorate.’
John Hall
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