English is the most widely used language in the history of our
planet. One in every 7 humans can speak it. More than half of the
world's books and 3 quarters of international mail is in English.
Of all the languages,it has the largest vocabulary - perhaps as many as
2 MILLION words. Nonetheless, let's face it - English is a crazy
language.
There is no egg in eggplant nor ham in hamburger; neither
apple nor pine in pineapple. English muffins weren't invented in
England or French fries in France. Sweetmeats are candies while
sweetbreads, which aren't sweet, are meat.
We take English for granted. But if we explore its paradoxes, we
find that quicksand can work slowly, boxing rings are square and a
guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig.
And why is it that writers write but fingers don't fing, grocers
don't groce and hammers don't ham? If the plural of tooth is teeth,
why isn't the plural of booth beeth? One goose, 2 geese. So one
moose, 2 meese? One index, 2 indices?
Doesn't it seem crazy that you can make am ends but not one amend,
that you comb thru annals of history but not a single annal? If you
have a bunch of odds and ends and get rid of all but one of them,
what do you call it?
If teachers taught, why didn't preacher praught? If a vegetarian
eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat? If you wrote a
letter, perhaps you bote your tongue?
Sometimes I think all the English speakers should be committed to an
asylum for the verbally insane. In what language do people recite at
a play and play at a recital? Ship by truck and send cargo by ship?
Have noses that run and feet that smell?
How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise man
and wise guy are opposites? How can overlook and oversee be
opposites, while quite a lot and quite a few are alike? How can the
weather be hot as hell one day and cold as hell another?
Have you noticed that we talk about certain things only when they
are absent? Have you ever seen a horseful carriage or a strapful
gown? Met a sung hero or experienced requited love? Have you ever
run into someone who was combobulated, gruntled, ruly or peccable?
And where are all those people who ARE spring chickens or who would
ACTUALLY hurt a fly?
You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language in which your
house can burn up as it burns down, in which you fill in a form by
filling it out and in which an alarm clock goes off by going on.
English was invented by people, not computers, and it reflects the
creativity of the human race (which, of course, isn't a race at all).
That is why, when the stars are out, they are visible, but
when the lights are out, they are invisible. And why, when I wind up
my watch, I start it, but when I wind up this essay, I end it.
Taken from the introduction to
kredit to saufi...
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