Finding Style in Forgotten English
I love the English language. I am referring here to the richness and texture of the language and the myriad of ways in which it allows itself to be used.
Depending on who does the counting and how, the English language comprises a half million plus words, not including what some philologists refer to as word forms (combination words, derivatives and phrases) and not including a further half million technical and scientific terms that daily appendage themselves, catalogued or otherwise, to our collective vocabulary.
There are the words that contribute to substance and others to style. Some words are themselves quite stylish. I have found that many of the more obscure words and those that have fallen into disuse can be counted among these.
Here are a few of the latter, lifted from Jeffrey Kacirk’s Forgotten English (with helpful explanations):
To chalm: to chew or nibble into fine pieces as do mice and my octogenarian Aunt Mable. In both cases, there are leftover signs of someone or something being there.
Pediluvium: a footbath. What would the long lost word have been for what is now a sitz bath, I wonder?
Erubescent: a blushing for shame. A word with just a hint of fragrance that probably explains the appropriateness of the blush.
Curlgaff: the shock felt when one first plunges into cold water. Under the circumstances, it likely ain’t just the gaff that curls.
Nullifidian: one of no faith or religion. Was there also a nullandvoidian, that is, one who doesn’t believe in the hereafter?
Vraisemblance: from the French, a true representation. This was replaced over time (for obvious reasons) by the much more common ‘verisimilitude’. To what kind of parties do I get invited, you ask?
For more of Forgotten English and more of Jeffrey Kacirk, go to: http://www.forgottenenglish.com.
In Praise of Quotations
Over the course of my career, I have made (altogether too) many presentations. I am not that charismatic a speaker and so I like to use props. Things like obscure and, at first glance, disconnected-from-plot paraphernalia, a little management by walking around, dazzling graphics that may or may not move around, just clever enough quips, judicious pauses and…in its proper place…the perfect quotation.
Concepts are the
Quotations – at least the good ones, used often and mangled often enough – eventually morph into maxims, aphorisms and proverbs. I don’t know the difference between the three. I am pretty sure that maxims are things your grandmother would have said while administering doses of cod liver oil. As in: “He deserves not the sweet that will not taste the sour.” Aphorisms are cicada-like creatures that clickety-click all night; they are short and sweet. As in: “Waste not, want not”. Clickety-click.
If they are unlucky enough, quotations or proverbs or whatever they become in the process of transition, will end up as clichés. Perfect quotes, especially if they become separated from he or she that did first utter them, could decline rapidly from hoity toity to hoi polloi. I have no idea how they have acquired the essence of backwash. They are clichés, after all, because they are timeless and because they are universal. They are truths against which there are no rebuttals. All this should, in theory, elevate their status; it should give them the scent of aristocracy. It should, but it doesn’t.
