Themethatisme on his blog, Conscientisation:
The English
Nothing "so fascinating, beautiful and culturally diverse yet as insular, self-important and irritating as England."
..so saith the writers of the 'Rough Guide' series for world travellers. I am delighted. "England is an irritating and insular country full of overweight, binge-drinking, reality TV addicts, a new guide warns tourists." they go on to say.
Unfortunately they also say some pleasant things too. Unlike several other commentators...
The English think soap is civilisation - Heinrich von Trietschke
Britain is the only country in the world where being 'too clever by half' is an insult. - A.A.Gill
The English have an extraordinary ability for flying into a great calm. - Alexander Woolcott ....
There's more, but the more is "over there" at his blog. As for his blog handle and the title of his blog, I know he chose them deliberately so that they'd be difficult to type. You have to actually THINK while you're typing them, especially with the added complication of the craaaazy English spelling.
"Crazy English spelling"
ReplyDeleteIt was ours first and you adopted it, ergo you are the mis-spellers!
Hah!
Juz coz we iz not obsessed with 'z's.
ReplyDeleteDP, you have a point. We changed some of the spelling that made no sense at all - phonetically speaking.
ReplyDeleteTheMe, my one word response. Phonics! You English could take a lesson.
Acksherly ...
ReplyDeleteWhen the first settlers arrived in North America, and even when the Pilgrims later shipped oars and decided that they would make a go of it, there was no standardised spelling. A brief glance at some of the work of the time reveals a wealth of spelling variation.
An interesting comparison is with the French colonists in Canada - who had standardized most of their language. (That was before words such as "le weekend"!)
The French have been much stricter in what is allowed as standard French than any of the English-speaking countries. The French go for purity and don't want their language corrupted and mongrelized by terrible English words such as "le weekend", with the result that French has a far smaller vocabulary than English.
ReplyDeleteWe take the foreign words in rather easily, but IMHO, it makes English a richer language. English has ever been a mongrel language anyway.
The French fight a battle that is already lost, because the people speak as they will speak.
Exactly, Grandmere!
ReplyDeleteAnd the more I think about it (Cat! Please run into the middle of that group of pigeons!) the U.S. spelling and even pronunciation of many words may be more original.
I will now duck!
I, the BB, can cast no stones in TMTIM's direction. I remember you lamenting having to cope with the name of my blog, Mimi, and justifiably so. Fortunately, we all now just click links.
ReplyDeletePaul, you dare not throw stones! And I DO still have to type the hard names when I do links.
ReplyDeletePuts me in mind of the comment on Earth Douglas Adams (an Englishman) had in his "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy:" "Harmless."
ReplyDeleteIt was to be amended, of course to: "Mostly Harmless."
Mostly harmless until an enabler like Tony Blair rises to a high place.
ReplyDeleteTheMe, my one word response. Phonics! You English could take a lesson.
ReplyDeleteYeah. English isn't complicated enough until the Americans got hold of it. Then "lift" became "elevator", "torch" became "flashlight", "footpath" became "sidewalk", even if it isn't on the side of anything; "post" became "mail" but still delivered by the "post" office and "loo" became "bathroom" even when there isn't a bathtub or shower in it.
Some lesson ;-)
Excuse me, Dan, but the sidewalk is on the side of the street. I'll give you bathroom, which has led to a good bit of confusion. Restroom is not much better, as it's hardly the place one would choose to have a rest.
ReplyDeleteDid you know the French entry in this year's Eurovision Song contest is in English?
ReplyDeleteI hear the second French revolution is underway.
DP, is the song in American (US) English or the strange tongue you speak "over there"?
ReplyDeleteFranglais actually.
ReplyDelete