You know who didn&#x27;t stop messing with Shakespeare&#x27;s language?<p>Translators.<p>Thankfully, we don&#x27;t need to read Shakespeare in the original Klingon but even then, the first English translation is already 400 years old. And it shows.<p>As a non-native speaker of English, the standard English version that is written adds another difficulty for enjoying his works. You not only need to look up all those obscure mythological references but also you need to understand the small but important differences in language. English has changed since the days of Shakespeare and as even native speakers struggle with that, it is even harder for non natives.<p>German has a long tradition of translations of Shakespeare (the first one dates from 1604!). The German &quot;standard&quot; translation is the Schlegel-Tieck joint translation from 1826 although it has been updated in parts ever since. But there are other translations as well. Wikipedia claims that the sonnets have been translated into German almost 50 times since 1967.<p>I think some native speakers have a problem with &quot;translating&quot; Shakespeare into modern English as the English of Shakespeare is still quite understandable. Just let English develop some 200 or 300 years longer and such translation will become a non-issue.<p>Unless the English speakers do something similar like the Greeks did and let old classics influence how they develop their language. But given the laissez-faire attitude of the English native speakers in the past and the influence of L2 speakers on the English language, I don&#x27;t expect this to happen.