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April 28, 2006
The Poor Letters
The poor letter! No, I don't mean the epistels sent by the needy, I mean the miserable sounds and signs. These few signs that are supposed to represent sounds, but they seem to be completely ignored. I have been hired as their attorney here, and on behalf of Mr. T., Ms. R, and Dr. U, I wish to call some people to the stand.
First, Mr. John Doe, from Long Island. If I may ask you, sir, to pronounce source report for me...
Mr. Doe: ehem... soace repoat...
Lawyer: your honor, as you can see, Mr. Doe here just committed two cases of manslaughter in front of the jury. Ms. R and her younger sister, Ms. Pre-Stop R. were just bruttally massacred. Now, if I may ask Ms. Jane Doe from Los Angeles to step to the witness stand...thank you madam. Would you please say the number twenty and the word letter for us...
Ms. Doe: tue-ni...ledre
Lawyer: again, your honor, you see that the poor Mr. T was killed once and in another instance, was reduced to a voiced dental stop, to say nothing of the mysterious disappearance of little baby e in the word letter. Now, for the last demonstration, can I ask Prof. Romanicarum to pronounce the name of Emperor Decius for us?
Prof. Romanicarum: Emperor Dee-shes.
Lawyer: Your honor, I rest my case! Not only was the poor Dr. U. cut down to an unimportant frontal weak vowel, but the old and glorius Mr. C., the prominent hard C of the old, was reduced to a miserable and awful sounding palatal sibilant. How, pray tell, does this happen? O gods of Cicero (pronounced Kikero) and Antoninus Pious (pronounced Anto-neen-us Pee-yus), bestow upon thine poor creatures the power of distinguishing the difference between sounds and give them the gift of pronunciation. In the name of the word, the letter, and the accursed elocution.
Posted by Khodadad at April 28, 2006 02:09 PM
Comments
A cute and funny post, Khodadad! :) Be sure to save this one for the textbook that you will write someday!
Posted by: David at April 29, 2006 11:02 PM