{"id":45170,"date":"2025-04-27T21:39:49","date_gmt":"2025-04-28T01:39:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/?p=45170"},"modified":"2025-04-27T21:43:16","modified_gmt":"2025-04-28T01:43:16","slug":"sonderling-sunday-momo-stories","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/?p=45170","title":{"rendered":"Sonderling Sunday – Momo – Stories"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>It’s time for Sonderling Sunday! That time of the week (well, that occasional time) when I play with language by looking at the German translation of children’s books – or, in this case, looking at the English translation of the classic children’s book, Momo<\/em>, by Michael Ende – which was one of my very first purchases when my family moved to Germany in 1996.<\/p>\n

Last time we looked at Momo<\/em>, we finished Chapter Four. So tonight we’ll begin Chapter Five, Kapitel F\u00fcnf<\/em>, which begins on Seite 49<\/em> in the German edition, and page 34 in the English edition. The chapter title in English is “Tall Stories,” but in German, it’s Geschichten f\u00fcr viele und Geschichten f\u00fcr eine<\/em>, which means “Stories for many and stories for one.”<\/p>\n

I like to start with the first sentence:
\nNach und nach war Momo f\u00fcr Gigi Fremdenf\u00fchrer ganz unentbehrlich geworden.
\n= “As time went by, Momo became absolutely indispensable to Guido.”<\/p>\n

<\/em>unsteten leichtherzigen jungen Kerl<\/em>
\n(“unsteady, light-hearted young fellow”)
\n= “footloose, fancy-free young man”<\/p>\n

struppigen kleinen M\u00e4dchen<\/em>
\n= “ragged little girl”<\/p>\n

Geschichtenerz\u00e4hlen<\/em> = “Making up stories”<\/p>\n

Besonders dann<\/em> = “Most of all”<\/p>\n

bl\u00fchte seine Phantasie auf wie eine Fr\u00fchlingswiese<\/em>
\n= “his imagination blossomed like a meadow in springtime”<\/p>\n

Hmm. They changed the names in the story instead of just using the same made-up words.
\nKaiserin Strapazia Augustina<\/em> = “Empress Harmonica”
\nK\u00f6nig Xaxotraxolus<\/em> = “King Raucous II”<\/p>\n

lachte sich ins F\u00e4ustchen<\/em> = “laughed up his sleeve”<\/p>\n

juwelengeschm\u00fcckten Suppenterrine<\/em> = “bejeweled soup tureen”<\/p>\n

je gr\u00f6\u00dfer, desto besser<\/em> = “the bigger, the better”<\/p>\n

Abgesandte<\/em> = “envoy”<\/p>\n

Unmengen Futter<\/em> = “vast quantities of food”<\/p>\n

Badewanne<\/em> = “bathtub”<\/p>\n

ihr ein und alles<\/em> (“her one and all”) = “the apple of her eye”<\/p>\n

Richtschnur<\/em> = “motto”<\/p>\n

And the end of that first story:
\nSie sehen daraus, meine Damen und Herren, wohin die Leichtgl\u00e4ubigkeit f\u00fchren kann!<\/em>
\n(Google translate: “You can see from this, ladies and gentlemen, where credulity [‘light-belief’] can lead!”)
\n= “Which only goes to show, ladies and gentlemen, how unwise it is to believe all you’re told.”<\/p>\n

Schirmm\u00fctze<\/em> = “peaked cap”<\/p>\n

Schleuse<\/em> = “floodgate”<\/p>\n

And I’ll finish with the wrap-up of that story:
\nund immer neue Erfindungen str\u00f6mten und sprudelten hervor, ohne da\u00df er \u00fcberhaupt nachdenken mu\u00dfte<\/em>
\n= “releasing a torrent of new ideas that bubbled forth without his ever having to think twice”<\/p>\n

And that’s all for tonight! I’m finishing on Seite 53<\/em>, page 37. Bis n\u00e4chste Zeit!<\/em> Meanwhile, je gr\u00f6\u00dfer, desto besser<\/em> is not necessarily the best Richtschnur<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s time for Sonderling Sunday! That time of the week (well, that occasional time) when I play with language by looking at the German translation of children’s books – or, in this case, looking at the English translation of the classic children’s book, Momo, by Michael Ende – which was one of my very first […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[184],"tags":[256],"class_list":["post-45170","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sonderling-sunday","tag-momo"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45170","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=45170"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45170\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":45175,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45170\/revisions\/45175"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=45170"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=45170"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=45170"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}