Master of Germanic Sentence, Revised

     My philological studies have satisfied me that a gifted person ought to learn English -- barring spelling and pronouncing -- in thirty hours, French in thirty days, and German in thirty years...The later tongue ought to be trimmed down and repaired. If it is to remain as it is, it ought to be gently and reverently set aside among the dead languages, for only the dead have time to learn it.
A Tramp Abroad by Mark Twain.

     Mark Twain complained about German newspapers, which were composed of two small pages, front and back. After reading the entire front page of one German newspaper, he found the first verb on the flip side. He was confused by exceptions to rules of grammar. He praised the capitalization of nouns, which made them easy to find. He studied the German language for six weeks while in Heidelberg in 1878.

     This last summer, when I was on my way back to Vienna from the Appetite-Cure in the mountains, I fell over a cliff in the twilight and broke some arms and legs and one thing or another, and by good luck was found by some peasants who had lost an ass, and they carried me to the nearest habitation, which was one of those large, low, thatched-roofed farm houses, with apartments in the garret for the family, and a cunning little porch under the deep gable decorated with boxes of bright-colored flowers and cats; on the ground floor a large and light sitting-room, separated from the milch-cattle apartment by a partition; and in the front yard rose stately and fine the wealth and pride of the house, the manure pile. That sentence is Germanic, and shows that I am acquiring that sort of mastery of the art and spirit of language which enables a man to travel all day in one sentence without changing cars.
Christian Science And The Book Of Mrs. Eddy by Mark Twain

Mark Twain wrote down several recommendations for changing the German language after “nine full weeks of devoted study.”

1. Leave out the dative case. It confuses the plurals. It is”an ornamental folly. Discard it.”

2. Move the verb further to the front of a sentence, so that “it can be seen with the naked eye.”

3. Import some strong English words, “to swear with.”

A German lady says to an American lady, “The two languages are so alike: we say Ach! Gott! You say goddamn!”

4. I would reorganize the sexes. He , she, and it.

5. “I would do away with long compounded words, or require the speaker to deliver them in sections, with intermissions for refreshments. To wholly do away with them would be best, for ideas are more easily received and digested when they come one at a time than when they come in bulk. Intellectual food is like any other; it is pleasanter and more beneficial to take it with a spoon than with a shovel.”

6. I would require a speaker to stop when he is done, and not add a string of useless formalities. These gewgaws undignify speech, instead of adding grace. They are, therefore, a disgrace, and should be discarded.

7. Discard the parenthesis, re-parenthesis, re-re-re-parenthesis. Infractions of this law should be punishable by death.

8. I would retain Zug and Schlag, with their pendants, and discard the rest of the vocabulary. This would simplify the language.