Klarinet Archive - Posting 000067.txt from 2000/02

From: David Glenn <notestaff@-----.de>
Subj: Re: [kl] Jelly doughnuts
Date: Wed, 2 Feb 2000 16:55:51 -0500

Tony Pay wrote:

> On Tue, 1 Feb 2000 16:44:25 -0800 (PST), leupold_1@-----.com said:
>
> > --- "Kevin Fay (LCA)" <kevinfay@-----.com> wrote:
> >
> > > Anyway, he told me that, given the way President Kennedy pronounced
> > > the sentence (bad German with a very heavy Massachusetts accent), a
> > > better translation would be "I am a jelly doughnut." This is
> > > probably not true, but more humorous than most urban legends.
> >
> > It is, in fact, a true story and a correct translation (one might
> > argue that "jelly" is added to increase the humor of the expression.)
> > It wasn't Kennedy's pronunciation that was problematic. His use of
> > the indefinite article "ein" -- intended to mean "a" -- changed the
> > meaning of the sentence. Had he left that word out, the correct
> > meaning would have been conveyed. Rien implied that his gaff was
> > intentional. That's where my knowledge of the occurrence ends, but
> > I've never heard anywhere else that Kennedy intentionally
> > misconstructed the sentence for its humor effect. Then again, it's
> > hard to imagine that his speech-writers would have allowed something
> > like that by mistake. Either way, it's a pretty funny story. :-)
>
> If by 'the story' you mean that Kennedy said, "Ich bin ein Berliner",
> then its truth is incontrovertible. I heard the recording of this
> speech on the day Kennedy made it, and have heard it several times
> since.
>
> On the other hand, the *correct* translation of what Kennedy said is of
> course, "I am a Berliner," and the people to whom he was speaking took
> him to mean precisely that. If you listen to him, and listen to the
> audience reaction, this becomes blatantly obvious.
>
> Kennedy spoke German on this occasion rather badly. But accurate
> translation of any particular phrase is always highly dependent on the
> context in which it occurs. In this case, the context was not only the
> rest of what he said, but where he said it, and who was present. Beyond
> that, there was also the political situation -- another sort of context.
>
> I should have thought all of this would be *especially* clear to a group
> of people who maintain that the word 'horn' means 'clarinet' on the
> Klarinet list but 'horn' on the Horn list, and who would explain that on
> occasion, "tell me about it" really means, "*don't* tell me about it."
>
> Tony
> --
> _________ Tony Pay
> |ony:-) 79 Southmoor Rd Tony@-----.uk
> | |ay Oxford OX2 6RE GMN family artist: www.gmn.com
> tel/fax 01865 553339
>
> ... He's got a magnet!!! Everybody BACKUP!!!!!!!!
>
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
> ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Und ich bin ein Amerikaner! That means either, I am a straight broom or a
pastry, take your choice. Well, at least I'm not a hamburger.

David

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