The great English etymologist Owen Barfield once wrote, “Words may be made to disgorge the past that is bottled up inside of them, as coal and wine, when we kindle or drink them, yield up their bottled sunshine.” When we uncap the sunshine that is stored inside the many words that relate to the Christmas […]
Carnivores eat meat. Herbivores consume plants. Verbivores devour words. I am such a creature. My whole life I have feasted on words — ogled their appetizing shapes, colors, and textures; swished them around in my mouth; lingered over their many tastes; and felt their juices run down my chin. During my adventures as a fly-by-the-roof-of-the-mouth […]
Centuries ago, the Pilgrims found in America a wild fowl somewhat similar in appearance to a guinea fowl they had known back in England — a fowl that acquired its name because it was first imported by way of Turkey, a Middle Eastern nation that doesn’t celebrate Thanksgiving. Because we perceive this bird as ugly […]
DEAR RICHARD: The Oxford comma, also known as the serial comma, is the comma used before the conjunction in a list of three or more items. For example: “I like to eat apples, bananas, and oranges.” I was taught to not place a comma before the word and in the example above. A big issue […]
’Twas Halloween Night (Thanks to Clement Clark Moore, who wrote “The Night Before Christmas.”) ’Twas Halloween night, and all through the house, All the creatures were stirring and eating a mouse. The monsters had gathered to plan and prepare For all trick-or-treaters they wanted to scare. Each creature stepped forth and performed energetically Their Halloween […]
Some punsters are so dedicated to their craft that they throw their hats into the ring at pun contests, which are currently held in multiple U.S. cities, as well as the United Kingdom. I regularly participate in a punderful event called Pundemonium at the Finest City Improv, 3746 Sixth Ave, in Hillcrest. The next Pundemoniums, which […]
When you think about it, the existence of a daily newspaper is a miracle. After all, a newspaper is an enormous product that must be manufactured almost from scratch every day. Even more incredible is that millions of words pour forth from the nation’s presses each day, and almost every one of them is grammatically […]
Some people lament that speaking and writing these days are simply a collection of faddish clichés patched together like the sections of prefabricated houses made of ticky-tacky. They see modern communication as a mindless clacking of trendy expressions. Why is English parlance in such a parlous state? Maybe it’s because verbal knee-jerkery requires no thought. […]
Hoo boy. Now that Kamala (emphasis on the first syllable of her first name, please) Harris and Tim Walz are running for president and vice president of the US of A, we are faced with a battle of apostrophes. Because their last names end with an “s” and a “z,” the looming question becomes what […]
For many years now, there has been circulating a continuously expanding poem. Its leaping-off place is the first verse of “That’s Amore,” the song by Harry Warren and Jack Brooks made famous by crooner Dean Martin: When the moon hits your eye Like a big pizza pie, That’s amore. Something about the rhythm of the […]