Monday, April 27, 2015

Commas, Prepositions and Lots of other Wordy Goodness.


I always understood that English evolves with time.  But my college Linguistics classes and my IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) theatre class never went into the fascinating detail covered in Mary Norris’s new book. 

Her fierce, at times academic, delivery of the information was challenging (maybe even boring) at first, but in no time, I found myself drawn back to the book time and time again, eager to get another small lesson in the life of our language. 

Who knew that, in addition to birthing a nation, many of our founding father’s invested time into the development of a language for our new England?  Here’s a passage that explains that:

Benjamin Franklin, who was already in his eighties when he befriended Webster (Noah) and who advocated spelling reform, had encouraged the younger man to adopt his ideas.  Franklin proposed that we lose c, w, y and j; modify a to u to represent their different sounds; and adopt a new form of s for sh and a variation of y for ng as well as tweak the h of gh to distinguish the sounds of”thy” and “thigh”, “swarth”, and “swathe.”

Wow.  My IPA studies provided a basic understanding of diacritical marks in order to use or teach accents and dialects to those who are not lucky enough to have refined ears.  I never gave thought to the fact that somebody had to actually study sounds and break them down to tiny components and then devise a way of to symbolically distinguish one sound from another.  Surly a myriad of uses exist for this knowledge other than theatre.  Think about how valuable intonation and inflection in pronunciation must be to the CIA and the FBI. 

This book is packed with information, including a look at the detailed work that goes into each edition of the New Yorker, where Mary Norris worked at a copy editor and where she learned to examine literary works with bionic eyes.  She brings that attention to detail to every subject in this book.   Norris devotes over ten pages alone to a discussion on gender neutral words and all the acceptable variations of s/he, his/hers and sheesh

If this sounds interesting but perhaps a bit much for an intro to language, try Richard Lederer’s The Miracle of Language.  Leaderer covers much of the same material but in a more playful and digestible fashion. 

As for me, my appreciation of  our language is growing along with my understanding that, like many things in life, sometimes even the traditional, time-tested ways of doing, being or saying need to be examined challenged, and YIKES! maybe even changed.  My greatest wish is that this book will finally drill into my head how to properly use commas.

Thanks for stopping by.



Monday, April 20, 2015

Charley's Aunt or ont...or awnt...or ant

Heart-A-Rama time - that means my reading has been reduced to Entertainment Weekly and the backs of cereal boxes.  Incidentally, those cereal boxes are worth taking a look at. Skip the nutritional info and move right on to the little quizzes, games and bits of trivia.

HAR did inspire me to re-read one of my favorite plays,  Charley's Aunt.  Of course, the play I could see and/or direct over and over is Harvey.  I love how kind Elwood is to everyone, even those who appear invisible.  His "It's our dreams that make us real" mantra is one I try to live by - always dreaming and scheming about the next project on my list.  

I've always wanted to direct Charley's Aunt, but the costume and set budget alone scare me.  Then there's matter of the word aunt.  Do we pronounce it ont? awunt?  or like that annoying little picnic pest - ant?   And, could I really find a male lead willing to wear the necessary corset for the bulk of the show? Structurally, this play is in three acts and that doesn't fly with modern audiences.  It is looooogh. To make myself happy, I used the plot as the basis for this year's HAR musical "Chuck Needs Money; Chuck Wants Romance; Chuck Gets Brand New Underpants".



The original plot revolves around Jack and Charley, private school  boys in love with Kitty and Amy and hoping for a bit of a weekend tryst.   However, when the expected chaperon for the boys' dates is delayed, they persuade a fellow student, Lord Fancourt Babberley, to don a stuffy aunt persona and fill that role.  All sorts of chaos ensues when Jack's father falls for the ersatz companion.  The chaperon, by the way, is from Brazil, "where the nuts come from" - my favorite line in the play.

This is a photo from the very funny movie version starring Jack Benny as Charley's Aunt.

Our HAR version does not stray far from the original and our twisted couple have been having all sorts of fun flirting and flouncing.  Of course we updated and our four students are a microcosm of today's kids - an  involved, annoying  activist, a disinterested punk, the popular girl, and the overly enthusiastic kid who tires but always misses the mark.  There's giggling, sarcasm and the most pitiful rendition of "Ain't No Sunshine" sung by our heartbroken lover.

A lot of people find reading plays awkward.  They miss the narrative elements providing details about setting and direct statements about characters moods' and motivations.  Plays give readers the opportunity to imagine those details as long as they are consistent with whatever hints the playwright provides for us.  I can read a play quickly, generally in one sitting.  That's a good thing at HAR time.  Now - gotta go - still deciding if I'm should torture my male lead with a corset.

Thanks for stopping by.

Steve - better get your cable reinstalled.  Tonight we're going to find out where Castle was when he went missing!


Monday, April 13, 2015

Apologies

OK...I know this the second week in row without a post. My apologies.

 Here's the scoop, I'm on some crazy meds and nothing I write makes any sense.  I started a post on Tom Maltman's visit to the Manitowoc Public Library tomorrow night and got it so hosed up there was nothing I could do to correct it.  Numerous attempts at cutting and pasting resulted in a post so miserably out of order that I have decided to stop trying.

My freind, Pat, always says "At least write one paragraph about something" - and so that is what I have done.  My Maltman post included lots of good stuff about being a Philosophy minor, Aristotle's Poetics, and what makes a book "good".  Maybe I'll be clearer for you all next week.