Mark Forsyth

The real surprise contained in a Kinder Surprise Egg

Keith Kahn-Harris’s charming conceit is that the warning message within is a skeleton key to the languages of the world

[Getty Images] 
issue 18 December 2021

The Rosetta Stone has an awful lot in common with a Kinder Surprise Egg. Hear me out. The actual text of the Rosetta Stone is mainly about some changes to tax rules, and is about as interesting as such things usually are. The one important fact about it, for us, is that it is written in three languages and three alphabets: Greek, Demotic and Hieroglyphics: the Language of the Ionians, the Language of the Documents, and the Language of the Gods. Thus hieroglyphics were decoded.

A Kinder Surprise Egg does an awful lot more than this. Tucked inside with the cheap plastic toy is a tiny sheet of paper that says: ‘WARNING, read and keep: Toy not suitable for children under three years. Small parts might be swallowed or inhaled.’ But the piece of paper does not just say it in English; it repeats the same message in 34 different languages and scripts.

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