Friedrich J. Mähliss
From Mark Twain in the German Language Press
Friedrich Mähliss (alternative spelling: Mähliß) was a German language teacher and writer who - in 1892 - published a 23-page brochure entitled Die Schrecken der deutschen Sprache [The Horrors of the German Language]. In his introduction to the text, Mähliss explicitly referred to the lecture Mark Twain had given under the same title in Dresden in December 1891 (4).
Mähliss was a member of the "Verein für vereinfachte Rechtschreibung" [Association for Simplified Spelling], founded in 1876, and editor of the journal Ortografen (Klenz 1050), which advocated for a radical reform and perceived "simplification" of German spelling. In a short critical review of Mähliss' text, Th. Matthias refers to Mähliss' efforts to convert passages from Goethe's Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre into his new proposed spelling and grammar unfavourably as a "Verballhornung" (54) of the German language, an idiomatic expression which at the time was used to describe the effort of trying to improve something while actually making it worse.
Further sources:
Article Pages
linked to Friedrich Maehliss (1)- MD-106 • [An attempt to simplify the German language] • 21 Jun 1892