Walls in Berlin, China and companies

Wise Words: walls

The world was watching as Germany celebrated the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall yesterday. Twenty years ago, the world was watching the images of people peacefully tearing down a wall that had become a Cold War symbol. It moved many to tears.

I was already living in Munich at the time, but, like the then Chancellor Helmut Kohl, I was out of the country. I was on a business trip to Spain. I was sitting in my hotel room when the famous images were played. I couldn’t understand the Spanish, but the images were clear enough. I understood what was going on. The wall that had been erected to separate a community came tumbling down. It became a symbol of hope.

Walls are not easy to destroy. This is probably why we use the word “wall” in some strong business expressions. Walls usually symbolize a problem.  Although there are very similar expressions in German, there are some small differences, particularly with the prepositions.  Here are my favourites.

go to the wall = kaputtgehen

A company that goes to the wall fails.

As with many expressions, Shakespeare may have influenced how we use “wall”, too. In Romeo and Juliet, which takes place in the walled city of Verona, one of the characters says at the beginning of the play: “the weakest goes to the wall”. It could come from the idea that the weakest (women and children) walked by the wall to avoid the dirt in the streets, the strongest walked by the street. It could also come from a swordfight. The weakest fighter would be pushed up against a wall and stabbed. Anything that “goes to the wall” therefore does not survive.

have one’s back up against the wall = mit dem Rücken zur Wand stehen

A person who is in a difficult situation has his back up against the wall. Anyone with his back up against the wall is in trouble and probably doesn’t have much of a choice about what he does next. If you have your back up against the wall, you are restricted in what action you can take.

drive sb. up the wall = jmdn. auf die Palme bringen

A person who is very annoying drives you up the wall.

go up the wall = die Wände hochgehen

A person who gets very angry goes up the wall.

talk to a brick wall = an die Wand reden

If you feel people aren’t listening to what you are saying, you feel like you are talking to a brick wall.

come up against a brick wall = plötzlich vor einer Mauer stehen

If you can’t make any progress because there are obstacles in your way, you come up against a brick wall.

Finally, don’t forget that there are still Chinese Walls. I’m not talking about the Great Wall of China, but the kind of invisible wall that is erected to prevent information passing from people who have it to people who would like it, but aren’t legally permitted to have it. Chinese walls are usually put up within financial companies: for example, between the advisory business and the trading business. They are there to protect confidentiality — and to prevent insider trading. They are less like the Great Wall of China (and the invisible wall that seems to protect Chinese communism) — and more like the Berlin Wall: they are known to come tumbling down.