Katzenmusik

German words that English should adopt

The maiden post of this series began with a paean to katzenfreundlich. However, in recommending the naturalization of that wunderbares word, I failed to mention that the language of the Brothers Grimm employs many other expressions that celebrate the weird and wonderful ways of our feline friends.

Thanks to The Katzenjammer Kids, who have graced the funny pages of American newspapers for more than a century, ‘katzenjammer’ has already found a home in American English. Moreover, while some friends of freedom fries have changed the pronunciation of that import, replacing the ‘y’ sound in ‘jammer’ with a hard ‘j’, all of us hold fast to the original meaning. That is, Americans use ‘katzenjammer’ to describe anything that resembles, whether in form or content (or both), the chaotic cacophony that sometimes erupts when Tom and Thomasina host a hoolie.

In 1927, for example, H.L. Mencken employed the word in the opening barb of a (less-than-friendly) review of four recently published works on the subject of American nationhood.

These books all belong to that literature of Katzenjammer which now flourishes so amazingly in the United States, vice the glad books, deceased: they all embody attempts to find out what is the matter with the Republic.

In the same year, the same author used the same word to make a more serious point.

On the other hand, they may lead the mob more sagaciously – and the result will presently be a full-fledged revolution, maybe successful and maybe not. If it succeeds, it invariably runs through three stages. At the start, the moderates have control, and efforts are made at compromise. When they fail the extremists take charge of things, and there is a complete overturn. The third stage is one of Katzenjammer.