If I learn German today, will I be able to read and understand Kant and Goethe?

If I learn German today, will I be able to read and understand Kant and Goethe?

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>If I learn German, will I understand German?

It's not unlikely you will.

Can you understand George Washington and Abe Lincoln? They lived around the same time.

I wonder if Kant liked America?

No one likes America.

He liked it. Read Amerika.

>Tocqueville

>de Tocqueville

Want to do this to read negative dialectics but too scared
:-(

Ja.

Depends on various factors.
I'm German and I can assure you that stuff like Goethe, Schiller, Kleist or pretty much any pre 20th century literature is borderline incomprehensible because the use of the language has changed so much. Even as a native speaker I need heaps of footnotes to get through something like Michael Kohlhaas, as well as a broad historic context.
Contemporary German literature is pretty much dead, film and art too. Theater is still good because of heavy governemtn funding, but that's about it.

If you want to invest time in learning a language as difficult as German, you should just go for Japanese or Russian instead. Viel Glück, user.

German doesn't seem to be that hard to learn, especially for an englishspeaker. Maybe it's just me being a native swedish speaker but german seems like one of the easier languages to learn.
US Department of State seems to think so too.
en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Wikibooks:Language_Learning_Difficulty_for_English_Speakers

Assuming you're a very dedicated learner a list for neing able to comprehend German authors would look like this:

>Frisch, Mann, Brecht, Suter, Zweig, Dürrenmatt
Yes

>Goethe, Schiller, Kafka, Kleist
Probably

>Kant
Unlikely

>Heidegger, Hegel
Highly unlikely

underrated

I mean if you can learn german in one day Kant probably won't be too hard.

wtf negro

Michael kohlhaas wasn't all that hard and old German shouldn't be incomprehensible if it's your mother's tongue

Never had problems reading anything past the year 1400 desu senpai

>Contemporary German literature is pretty much dead, film and art too
'Scuse me?

>tfw ersteinwanderer and didn't have much problem with Goethe or Kleist
Maybe you're just dim, senpai.

There are exceptions of course, but it's pretty undeniable that German cinema is a shadow of its former self: it's so oversaturated with subsidiary money economically, and self-absorbed / congratulatory thematically that any creative spark is snuffed out. It has the worst of both worlds, the elitism of arthouse and the low-effort mentality of Hollywood mega studios. Sure, Fassbender, Herzog and Haneke (two of whom don't even work in Germany) make something good every once in a while but once they retire there'll be nothing left. Japan and France struggle too but their decline is a blunder next to the German travesty.

I think the last good German films I've seen were Oh Boy and Zeit der Kannibalen (which nobody has seen).

I didn't enjoy Toni Erdmann. I can see the appeal, but cringe humor just doesn't click with me, to me it felt like watching an incredibly pretentious version of the office (or Stromberg, to stay in Germany).

>t. Lektürehilfe gelesen anstatt Buch

I'd say my intelligence is slightly below average. I'm in my mid twenties and nobody in my generation ever reads German literature unless they happen to study Germanistik auf Lehramt at Uni. I realize I may be a frustrated and bitter concerning the whole topic, though...

Den deutschen Kanon sollte man mit 16 bereits durchgearbeitet haben.
Gibt ja noch Anderes auf der Welt.

just learn basic grammar and vocab, read the ashton side-by-side with the online translation here and a german copy. nobody reads original language anymore. the only time you really need to refer to it is for interpretation, which translation tools, basic dictionary and research competence, and existing translations can help you with

This is pretty accurate. I grew up speaking both German and English, lost some German over time, but in the last year have become fluent again by reading Durrenmatt, Mann, Zweig and when im feeling good Kafka, Goethe and Nietzsche. Good recs

Most Germans won't understand Kant in their livetime