This chapter is an introduction. In it you will not learn anything important. Here we will show you that German does not always sound the same by giving you some different voice examples.

Some comments on beauty in general.

You often hear that German sounds ugly. The author has to admit that if you are referring to the sound of the German language, it hardly passes as a beautiful language. However, language is an instrument of communication, something that is to be used on an everyday basis; and things of everyday use usually lose their aesthetic value. Imagine you have a house at the sea. Everyone just says: Oh, how nice it is, how beautiful to live there! But you have lived there for 10 years. Would you still think that it's so wonderful? What's the point of this little side trip? Well, it's not really important how a language sounds. Take marriage as another example; it's nice to have a beautiful husband or wife, but it is better to have someone with whom you can live your entire life. It's not that easy to get divorced from a language. We can assure you that as a language German is just fine. We Germans are able to clearly express ourselves, and in our feelings and poetry we can even express things that have no words. So, come on and find out the inner beauty of this language!