Schopenhauer’s Advice for the Aspiring Polyglot

‘On Language and Words’ tells us the best ways to internalize our target language

Photograph of Author Schopenhauer, in the public domain

Schopenhauer was an interesting if not a bit controversial man in his time. There’s this rumor I keep hearing that he was the owner of a series of poodles, each named Atman. I couldn’t find a great source, but he is noted in several places as being highly interested in eastern philosophy, so it’s a great joke on his part.

That level of interest in culture is what shapes his advice. He’s credited as speaking seven languages — a borderline impossible task for us mere mortals. In his essay ‘On Language and Words,’ he does give us some insight as to how he became so proficient in all of these languages.

On Collocations

Those of limited ability will not readily master a foreign language in the real sense of the term. They learn the foreign words, it is true, but always use them only in the sense of their approximate equivalent in their own tongue, and invariably retain the idioms and phrases peculiar thereto.