For the last decade or so Germany has been embroiled in a purported "reform" of
the orthography of the German Language ("Rechtsschreibreform"). Not a bad idea,
you might think, considering how fraught with difficulties the written language
is/was. This movement, which is still very controversial — and which has been
boycotted by several major national newspapers — has been spearheaded by a
small group of educators and publishers in Stuttgart, who are not without their
own financial interests in change. While their aims may once have been
laudable, they have, in the course of their work, managed, through publication
of a series of conflicting dictionaries and reference works, managed to make
the matter so complicated — and in a number of cases plain ridiculous — that
even those responsible for teaching German in the schools are not always sure
of the right answer.
In the case in point, the reform has led to the tendentious phasing out of "das
Eszett" — muss instead of muß, for example. But the Eszett is still hanging in
there bravely.
And only "Mäßig/mäßig" is correct today. That some publishers still manage to
get it wrong is typical of the situation today.
Cheers!
EFF
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Habsburger Verlag Frankfurt (Dr. Fiedler)
www.habsburgerverlag.de
[email protected]
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On 21.09.2012, at 00:18, David H. Bailey wrote:
> I have to take issue with the "never find" -- in a Schott edition, with
> the copyright bearing the the company name of "B. Schott's Sohne,
> Mainz", of the Hindemith Trumpet Sonata, in the score it is spelled
> "Mäßig" but in the solo part it's spelled "Mässig." I've seen the word
> most of the time engraved "Mässig."
>
> So it might be wrong, but if German engravers do it you can't fault the
> rest of us for doing it too. ;-)
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