home
***
CD-ROM
|
disk
|
FTP
|
other
***
search
/
TIME: Almanac 1990
/
1990 Time Magazine Compact Almanac, The (1991)(Time).iso
/
time
/
050189
/
05018900.050
< prev
next >
Wrap
Text File
|
1990-09-17
|
1KB
|
39 lines
LETTERS, Page 8The Everest of English
Thanks to Paul Gray for his review of the exciting new edition
of the Oxford English Dictionary (BOOKS, March 27). He expressed
doubt that the samples of new, inelegant words included would
inspire an ode by Keats, but how about some Shakespearean verse?
What if the Bard of Avon should
return
From undiscovered country's
bourn, and see
The changes in our language!
Could he learn
To versify with terms from OED?
What would he say to crack and
acid rain?
"Shall I compare thee to a
summer's day?" . . .
To barf and drunk tank -- words
no way germane
To love and sonneteering?
What would he say
To brain-dead, or greenmail, the
right-to-die?
What would he say? "What's
happened to romantics?
These samples -- all pejorative
semantics!"
Frank C. Flowers
Lafayette, La.
I wouldn't want to play Scrabble with John Simpson or Edmund
Weiner, the co-editors of the OED2.
Jon Banfill
Seattle