Harry Heathcote of Gangoil

here a nice map for people that forget what was hiding behind the German Reich in the south-east. in the Austro-Hungarian Empire practically all officials down to the postman had to have a basic knowledge of German; lateron - as always - languages were sadly abused like religions.

 

Well, yes, I believe it because it's true. European chauvinism aside, Tauchnitz DID make most of their money selling books in English, as noted in the link I provided:

"He appears to have decided early to specialise in publishing editions in foreign languages, and particularly English. The first volume in the ‘Tauchnitz Collection of British Authors’ appeared in 1842 and over the next 100 years the series went on to comprise some 5370 volumes. Although it included the works of many American, as well as British authors, from as early as volume 15 in the series, it was not until 1914 that the name of the series was extended to include British and American Authors."

They did indeed have trouble during the Great War, but were not pushed from their roost until the 1930s. Many Europeans were well aware that English literature was the up-and-coming thing, notably Dickens, but including many others.

German was necessary for serious students of engineering and science in the States too, until World War Two, and often some Russian & French, with important journals published in all those languages. If you wanted to get ahead, you had to be able to read them. If you wanted to be culturally aware, you read English novels.