Saturday, June 23, 2007

Did you read, or have you read?

Can you read these right the first time?
  1. The bandage was wound around the wound.
  2. The farm was used to produce produce .
  3. The dump was so full that it had to refuse more refuse.
  4. We must polish the Polish furniture.
  5. He could lead if he would get the lead out.
  6. The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert.
  7. Since there is no time like the present, he thought it was time to present the present.
  8. A bass was painted on the head of the bass drum.
  9. When shot at, the dove dove into the bushes.
  10. I did not object to the object.
  11. The insurance was invalid for the invalid.
  12. There was a row among the oarsmen about how to row.
  13. They were too close to the door to close it.
  14. The buck does funny things when the does are present.
  15. A seamstress and a sewer fell down into a sewer line.
  16. To help with planting, the farmer taught his sow to sow.
  17. The wind was too strong to wind the sail.
  18. Upon seeing the tear in the painting I shed a tear.
  19. I had to subject the subject to a series of tests.
  20. How can I intimate this to my most intimate friend?

Let's face it - English is a crazy language. There is no egg in eggplant, nor ham in hamburger; neither apple nor pine in pineapple. English muffins weren't invented in England or French fries in France. Sweetmeats are candies while sweetbreads, which aren't sweet, are meat. We take English for granted. But if we explore its paradoxes, we find that quicksand can work slowly, boxing rings are square and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig.

And why is it that writers write but fingers don't fing, grocers don't groce and hammers don't ham? If the plural of tooth is teeth, why isn't the plural of booth, beeth? One goose, 2 geese. So one moose, 2 meese? One index, 2 indices? Doesn't it seem crazy that you can make amends but not one amend? If you have a bunch of odds and ends and get rid of all but one of them, what do you call it?

If teachers taught, why didn't preachers praught? If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat? Sometimes I think all the English speakers should be committed to an asylum for the verbally insane. In what language do people recite at a play and play at a recital? Ship by truck and send cargo by ship? Have noses that run and feet that smell?

How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites? You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language in which your house can burn up as it burns down, in which you fill in a form by filling it out and in which, an alarm goes off by going on. English was invented by people, not computers, and it reflects the creativity of the human race, which, of course, is not a race at all That is why, when the stars are out, they are visible, but when the lights are out, they are invisible.

PS. - Why doesn't "Buick" rhyme with "quick"?

5 comments:

Gina E. said...

Ever tried to learn Chinese?

Pirate said...

You are a genius. Why no mention of two, to, or too? Why is there noe w in one and there is in two?

Unknown said...

Pete, did you see Melvyn Bragg's series on the English language on SBS? I think it was on last year. It was brilliant and explains a lot about what you mentioned. I knew a bit but only from Middle English forward which is about the standard ELit101 course. Bragg was so enlightening and went back further than ME. And you had to keep up - he had so much information to convey there was no dawdling. It is rare for me, once I have seen a program, to want to own the DVD but I wish someone would give me this series for Christmas. And, yes, I could read that section correctly - but then I used to get prizes as a kid for impromptu reading!

Gina E. said...

Hey Pete, when are you going to start posting again? I keep checking your blog to see what you've come up with...did you do any more with the radio station?

Crookedpaw said...

Pirate: No genius, just passing on something that has been doing the rounds for a long time. But when you think about it, English is by far the hardest language to learn, let alone master. No wonder people don't speak it proper.

Miss eagle: No, I never saw the series. What I've learned is from reference texts which explain the root of our language. I find it extremely helpful as I believe that each word has its own vibration, and to find the true root behind a word allows me to "tune" the sentence correctly.

Gina: Sorry about the lack of posting. No excuses, just slack. Sometimes, it seems I get a little tired of the blog, and procrastinate and find something else to do (usually meaningless) in order to avoid my commitment. To try and fix this problem, I've set myself a writing exercise at http://writingtheimage.blogspot.com/ to try and instill some discipline.