From the Archives - Sting’s Lyrical Blunders

Introduction

About fifteen years ago, my brother emailed me a blog post by Charles Petzold about a fairly major goof in Sting’s lyrics to “Don’t Stand So Close to Me.”  The essay had to do with Sting’s allusion to the book Lolita, and the age of Vladimir Nakobov’s evil pedophile character, Humbert Humbert. Sting refers to Humbert as “the old man,” but he simply isn’t old. Petzold’s post also recounts a more widespread criticism of the song, which is Sting’s inane rhyming of “Nabokov” with “cough.”

What follows is my original response to my brother (which I’ve fleshed out a bit for this presumably larger audience). But first, some background.

Highlights of Petzold’s post

Petzold’s blog post begins by quickly recounting the botched rhyme in Sting’s lyrics:

The music magazine Blender recently cited Sting as the worst lyricist ever (story here), in part for the atrocious lyric [It’s no use, he sees her/ He starts to shake and cough/ Just like the old man in/ That book by Nabokov]. At the time the song first came out, much was made of Sting’s ridiculous pronunciation of Vladimir Nabokov’s last name, which should properly be accented on the second syllable.

Then Petzold takes Sting to task for suggesting that Nabokov’s antihero is old:

The “old man” — the narrator of [Lolita] who adopts the pseudonym Humbert Humbert — is hardly old! In May 1947, when Humbert Humbert first meets Dolores Haze, he is 36 or 37 and she is 12. He dies at the age of 42, and she dies at the age of 17. This is not a matter of “inside knowledge” or reading between the lines. Nabokov is extremely precise in the chronology of the novel, and only the most superficial reading (or, more likely in this case, none at all) could [miss] all the signposts.

My commentary, informed by my long study of Nabokov’s work and the two years of Russian I took in high school, elaborates on both gaffs.

Sting’s Lyrical Blunders – October 11, 2007

Petzold makes good points. I have long been bothered by that mispronunciation (made all the worse for its being the very last word of the song). For years, when I’d sing this (e.g., in the shower), I would change the lyrics to “just like the old man in that book by Vladimir.” This fixes the meter, in that the great writer’s name isn’t accentuated on the wrong syllable, but of course my substitution fouls up the rhyme. Not that Sting’s rhyme was exactly right to begin with; “Nabokov” is correctly pronounced “Na-BOH-kov,” with the final letter being basically a “v” sound, perhaps slightly closer to an “f” than the classic English “v” but in any event a poor match with the simple “f” sound in “cough.”

So, to fix both the meter and the rhyme, and the age while I’m at it, here’s how I will sing the last two lines from now on:

It’s no use, he sees her
He’s feeling really queer
Just like the gross man in
That book by Vladimir

I suppose I’m not on completely safe ground with “Vladimir,” since a very strict Russian pronunciation would accentuate the second syllable, which would have a bit more of an “e” sound, so the word would more properly rhyme with “redeemer.” But I think enough Americans say “VLAD-i-mere” that this is a significant improvement.

Now, in case you’re wondering if it’s fair to say Humbert Humbert felt “queer,” I think it certainly is. At one point late in the novel, when Lolita is starting to distance herself from Humbert, he describes how “I sat down on the grass with a quite monstrous pain in my chest and vomited up a torrent of browns and greens that I had never remembered eating.” That would be a pretty queer feeling indeed (and in any case I don’t remember Humbert shaking and coughing at any point in the book).

What’s arguably even lamer than the rhyme itself is Sting’s effort to defend himself. His website, sting.com, provides this quote (taken from an interview):

Okay, I can defend that. Sometimes rhymes can be so bad they can shock you into listening to them. Most good, full rhymes are just Hallmark card stuff. Moon, June, erm, balloon. But I’ve used that terrible, terrible rhyme technique a few times. Technically, it’s called a feminine rhyme—where it’s so appalling it’s almost humorous.

Okay, let me get this straight: Sting deliberately mispronounced “Nabokov,” to make it rhyme with “cough,” just to shock the listener into listening? What was the listener doing before? Zoning out? Listening to something else? Yeah, right. “Don’t Stand So Close to Me” is actually a rather good song, and this is the very end of it; if there was any need to shock the reader into listening, that would more appropriately be done closer to the beginning.

Meanwhile, the bit about “feminine rhyme” further showcases Sting’s appalling willingness to shamelessly spout bullshit without regard to the possibility that he’ll be fact-checked. “Feminine rhyme” is not characterized by being appalling or shocking. As M.H. Abrams explains in his excellent Glossary of Literary Terms, a feminine rhyme “consists of a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed syllable” and, “since it involves the repetition of two syllables, is also known as a double rhyme.” Examples would be feather/heather and ending/bending. Does this type of rhyme get employed in pop music? Sure! Check out these lines from Eminem:

Yo! His palms are sweaty, knees weak, arms are heavy
There’s vomit on his sweater already: Mom’s spaghetti

Feminine rhyme is what Sting should have employed, since “Nabokov” is a word whose final syllable is unstressed. What Sting actually made was a masculine rhyme, which “consists of a single stressed syllable” such as in bore/poor and louche/douche. If he wished to employ a feminine rhyme in order to achieve metrical accuracy, Sting should have rhymed Nabokov with “fuck off.”

A final note on the botched rhyme and Sting’s lame defense of it: twice on one page of sting.com, Nabokov is spelled “Nabakov.” This further suggests that Sting simply didn’t know how to pronounce the name; obviously, flubbing the penultimate syllable wasn’t necessary in order to achieve the single (masculine) rhyme with “cough.”

Getting to Petzold’s main point, the inaccuracy of “old man” in the final verse of that song: this hadn’t previously dawned on me, and it’s a very good observation. I suppose I’ve allowed the casting in the two Lolita movies to distort my perception of Humbert’s age (and shame on me, because I’ve read that book at least three or four times). Of course, Sting was pretty young when he wrote that song, but was he young enough to think of 36 as old? Well, we can do some rudimentary math here based on the line “this girl is half his age.” If we assume this is high school, the girl is between 14 and 18. (On his website, Sting recalls how “I’d done teaching practice at secondary schools and been through the business of having 15-year-old girls fancying me—and me really fancying them!” Eww.) So the narrator of the song is presumably around 30. Perhaps a little kid would think 36 is old, but not a 30-year-old.

I suppose Sting could try to argue that he meant “old man” as in “father,” as Humbert was in fact Lolita’s legal stepfather for most of the book. But would he really expect all his listeners to have read the book to know that? Besides, it’d be “her old man,” not “that old man.” No dice.

As a final Hail Mary, Sting could always deny that he was talking about the book Lolita at all—after all, there are plenty of shaking and coughing old men in Nabokov’s books. This would be a weak defense, of course, given the subject matter of the song, but there’s still hope: Sting could claim that he was alluding to The Enchanter, a Nabokov novella that’s also about a pedophile (and was an early precursor to Lolita). I can’t recall the age of its awful protagonist, but at least he is described as “balding.” But from the perspective of that hypothetical defense, Sting nullified it when he recorded a new version of the song in 1986 and changed “that book by Nabokov” to “that famous book by Nabokov.” I doubt anybody would call The Enchanter a famous book. And in interviews Sting has mentioned his admiration of Lolita.

I think it’s appropriate that Sting topped the list of awful lyricists. I saw a documentary about him from 1985, and he just came off as a pompous ass. In one scene, Sting asks his drummer or somebody whether “chasm” is pronounced with a “k” sound or a “ch” sound. This makes me wonder if he really writes his own lyrics to begin with. I mean, who would use a word he doesn’t even know how to pronounce? Oh, wait ... Sting, obviously.

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More War of Words

Introduction

I’ve long envied syndicated columnists, because a) they make money from writing, and b) people actually write to them with questions and comments, from which the columnist can often wring a whole column.  He can get past writer’s block by performing a kind of alchemy, turning a mere reader’s humble feedback into literary gold.

Of course, this blog doesn’t bring about many useful comments.  The percentage of albertnet pageviews that have resulted in comments stands at 0.36%.  Occasionally I take on the role of the reader and write in myself (e.g., Ask Dr. Beer, Ask Dr. Pasta) but of course that’s cheating.  At other times, as with my recent “Grammar Wars” post, I write something provocative and hope for the best.

I was not disappointed in the case of “Grammar Wars.”  A friend of mine, Trevor, posted not one but two comments, comprising a number of contrarian statements.  (Ah, that last sentence was satisfying ... a boss of mine once argued that “comprising” cannot be used this way—that you can only say “comprised of”—and it hurt me to subjugate the truth of my position beneath the greater truth that you must not alienate the guy who controls your salary.) 

I have waited awhile before countering my friend’s arguments, to see if anybody would come to my defense (as happened with an incoherent and profane attack leveled at my British Faucet post).  Nobody has, though a mutual friend posted a simple “Wow,” most likely in response to the comments rather than the post.  Knowing that Trevor’s comments were deliberately (if playfully) pugnacious, I will give him the honor and satisfaction of a thorough rebuttal.

But first...

It’s tempting to get right to it, and if you’re growing impatient, just scroll down to the phrase “Shibboleths and marketing” right now.  But if you enjoyed “The Deer Hunter” and feel that all the pre-Vietnam exposition was worth the trouble, stay right here because I’ve got a couple of asides to get to.

First, I must point out that debating Trevor in a public forum feels a bit like an insurrection, like Obi Wan Kenobi deciding it’s time to give Yoda a real beat-down.  This is because for the first couple years of our friendship, Trevor and I observed a strict pecking order:  he was the star cyclist on our UC Santa Barbara cycling team, and I was the mere domestique (i.e., selfless helper).  It was I who nicknamed Trevor “Red Five,” after Luke Skywalker; I came upon this nickname while giving Trevor a lead-out, sprinting just ahead of him well before the line and pulling off so that he’d be in perfect position to win (“You’re all clear, kid!”).  Here’s a picture of one such lead-out, at the National Collegiate Championship criterium.  I’m the third guy, having already done my work and pulled off; the second guy, Dave, has just finished his pull, and Trevor is about to launch.  (Did he win this sprint?  Of course.)

One more thing.  You may be curious about the last thing Trevor wrote:  “[Heh.  For those of you who know Dana really well, this is the proverbial birthday cake covered in ants.]”  This comment establishes—in fact, celebrates—Trevor’s appreciation of how much I love a good showdown.  It refers to the tale I told him of a gorgeous, perfect chocolate layer cake I almost lost.  I grew up in Boulder, some 5,000 feet above sea level, where it’s basically impossible to bake good cakes, because they rise to much and become fluffy and tough.  So I was really excited about a cake my mom baked at my grandfather’s house in the Napa valley, down here at sea level.  To draw out our enjoyment, we put the cake one of those old-fashioned covered cake pedestals and went for a two-hour appetite-inducing walk.  When we returned, the beautiful cake was absolutely teeming with red ants.  They were all stuck in the frosting, either battling to get free or in the throes of a sugar orgy.  For a moment it seemed all was lost and I could have just wept.  But then anger took over, and I decided to get Keyser Söze on their ant asses and just eat the cake anyway.  It filled me with the deepest satisfaction to give those ants a terrible death, matching their rapaciousness with my own.

Shibboleths and marketing

“I've been duped!” Trevor writes in his first comment.  “Where’s the grammar?!  Shibboleths and marketing!”

Well, I can’t argue this point:  my “Grammar Wars” post was as much about spelling (“just desserts”) and pronunciation (“process-ease”) as it was about grammar.  In response to “where’s the grammar?” I can at least offer up the “who” vs. “whom” tale, because grammar is at the heart of that (specifically, the issue of whether a certain pronoun replaces an object or a subject).  I’m not willing to call that a spelling error because nobody spells who “whom.”  What would other misspellings be?  Whobever?  Whonever? 

Meanwhile, “shibboleths” really threw me.  This is one of those words that I always have to look up, and then after understanding and appreciating its meaning I promptly forget it, and then the cycle repeats.  The gist of “shibboleth” is judging somebody by how he speaks; in an Old Testament tale, “pronunciation of this word was used to distinguish Ephraimites, whose dialect lacked a /ʃ/ phoneme (as in shoe), from Gileadites whose dialect did include such a phoneme.”  The consequences of mispronunciation were dire:  Gileadite soldiers would detain and quiz suspected Ephriamite war refugees, and “If anyone said, ‘Sibboleth’ because he could not pronounce ‘Shibboleth,’ then they would seize him and kill him.” 

This shibboleth concept is a nice way to explain why grammar, spelling, and pronunciation matter:  because whether you like it or not, well-educated people will judge you by these things.  So perhaps I should have called my post “The Shibboleth Wars.”  I’m not sure that would attract much of an audience, though.  It sounds to me like the name of the next installment in the “Star Wars” series, continuing along the descent-into-boredom trajectory set by “The Phantom Menace.”  But why does “The Grammar Wars” connote marketing in Trevor’s mind?  Is “grammar” a sexy word?  I don’t think so, and  I deny the suggestion that I deliberately duped Trevor the way a marketer would, simply because I give my blog post titles very little thought.  “War of the Words” probably would have been better, but it’s too late now.

Artisanal

Trevor argues quite rightly that “artisanal” is not only a legitimate word, but is a very useful one in identifying “that certain type of Bay Area hipster pretension that we love to hate.”  Most of the paragraph he devotes to this matter is useful and persuasive, and ties in nicely with his earlier mention of shibboleth.  But I cannot abide his opening sentence, “The suffix -al is perfectly fine and acceptable to form adjectives, nouns, and verbal actions.”  There is an admirable air of authority about this bold declaration, bringing to mind the breezy but ironclad rules set forth by William Strunk, Jr. and E.B. White in The Elements of Style.  Unfortunately, Trevor’s sentence is only sometimes true.  You can’t just slap “-al” on any old word you please; if you could, we’d have words like craftsmanal and mavenal.  Also, how do you form a noun using the suffix “-al”?  Were “bacchanal” and “finial” formed this way?  I think not.  And verbal actions?  What verb ends in “-al”?  Total, as in “I totaled my parents’ car?”  Okay, the more standard “corral” is a legitimate verb (and noun), but again, I doubt it was built out of “core” + “-al.”  Neither was “coral,” I might add.

Process[ease]

Trevor has no problem with “process-ease.”  He suggests that this pronunciation often has a purpose:  to differentiate between the noun and verb forms of this word:  “Those who say process[ease] almost always reference the noun and not the verb.”  It’s sweet to think that people are this helpful, but a) in my experience people aren’t that helpful, b) the English language relies heavily on word order, not pronunciation, for meaning, and c) it would be pretty hard to confuse the noun and verb forms of this word anyway.  Can you think of a single example of a sentence where the meaning would be hard to distinguish through context alone?  “Tom processes the invoices carefully” is not likely to have anybody wondering, “What are ‘Tom’ processes, and what do they do?”

Now, one thing I didn’t so much as mention in my post is the matter of the “o” in “processes.”  Trevor suggests that somebody might say, “This device pr[aw]cess[es] widgets by different pr[oh]cess[ease] depending upon which buttons you press.”  Whoa, whoa, whoa. 

I don’t have a big problem with the long “o” in “pr[oh]cess,” it being a perfectly valid pronunciation and the norm in the UK.  (I fact-checked this with a British friend of mine, and though he validated that he’s heard only “pr[oh]cess” over there, he was quick to add that he can’t speak for the whole nation.  This is exactly the kind of timid priggishness America’s founders came here to escape.) 

I sometimes say “pr[oh]cess” myself, though only when talking to my kids (and mimicking the British female robot voice of a talking ATM from which I first heard this pronunciation).  But I don’t think I could bring myself to say “pr[oh]cess” in other situations because, to my mind, a British pronunciation from the mouth of an American smacks of affectation.  I grow increasingly aware that a British accent, especially in business, connotes intelligence, sophistication, and global savvy.  Many years ago I worked with a customer who, to my surprise, turned out to be an idiot despite his strong British accent.  It didn’t seem possible for an idiot to speak that way.  Since then I’ve been less naive and have discovered that a British accent doesn’t actually guarantee intelligence or education.  In fact, I’m suspicious now when I hear a British accent; I ask myself, “Could this person have risen this high in corporate America for no other reason than that cool accent?”

With all this in mind, it wouldn’t surprise me a bit to hear an American saying “pr[oh]cess,” and the kind of American who strives to sound fancy and intellectual by saying “process-ease” is exactly the kind who would affect the long “o.”  But I cannot imagine there’s anybody who mixes the British and American pronunciations in order to help differentiate between noun and verb forms, as Trevor suggests with “pr[aw]cess[es] widgets by different pr[oh]cess[ease].”  This kind of mix-and-match usage would be almost as absurd as the flat-top mullet I talked a barber into giving me back in the 1980s.  I know it’s impossible to prove a negative, but I hope to God there aren’t really people out there mixing British and American pronunciation of a word within a sentence.  If anybody reading this has heard such a thing, let me know.  (If there’s anybody reading this at all.  Hey, you, there in the back ... wake up!  Have you heard this kind of British/American pronunciation mash-up?)

I wish I could stop now—I feel like I’ve eaten three or four large pieces of ant-infested cake—but I’m not done yet.  I still have to deal with a sentence so inflammatory I almost wonder if it was consciously designed to sacrifice logic and Truth for the sake of pure provocation:  “The noun [process-ease] is frequently used in some quasi-scientific context and the [ease] is consistent with the pronunciation of the plural forms of analysis, neurosis, prognosis, and so on.”

First of all, citing the frequency of a pronunciation is no justification.  Should we also accept “nuke-yoo-lar” and “ree-la-tor” just because lots of people pronounce “nuclear” and “realtor” that way?  And how does “some quasi-scientific context” deserve my support?  To me, “quasi-scientific” brings to mind disgraceful ideas like the Atkins diet (don’t even get me started on that). 

As for the second part of that statement, the “process–ease” pronunciation only seems consistent with words of Greek origin like analysis, neurosis, and prognosis.  As the American Heritage Dictionary points out, “’process’ is not of Greek origin, and there is no etymological justification for this pronunciation of its plural.”  Proceeding from analysis/analyses to process/process-ease is no more valid than saying “gen-WEE-nee” for “genuine” while pointing to “linguine” as justification.  And we don’t say “van-EE-ah” for “vanilla” even though you could claim it’s consistent with the pronunciation of “tortilla.”

Spaces after a period

Trevor goes on to write, “And since we're bringing it, do my poor eyes deceive me or are you adding two spaces after every period? From Robert Bringhurst’s ‘The Elements of Typographical Style,’ which I highly recommend:

In the nineteenth century, which was a dark and inflationary age in typography and type design, many compositors were encouraged to stuff extra space between sentences. Generations of twentieth-century typists were then taught to do the same, by hitting the spacebar twice after every period. Your typing as well as your typesetting will benefit from unlearning this quaint Victorian habit.

At first blush, this instruction seems compelling.  I have blogged at length about how the limitations of early typewriters have created the terribly awkward QWERTY keyboard that society is still bound to.  Having put forth the considerable effort required to abandon that layout, I would be happy to switch to a single space after each period, if I were to agree that this practice was based on a long-ago design principle that is now defunct.  What I’d like to ask Bringhurst is why compositors were encouraged to add extra space.  What is meant by “dark and inflationary” age?  What is the link between the behavior and the equipment?

I do add two spaces after a period, because I was taught to do so by my junior high typing teacher, Mr.  Todd.  This wasn’t his idea, of course; it was right there in the textbook.  The idea is that the extra space helps the reader identify the end of a sentence.  Sure, we have a period for that, but periods exist within sentences, too (e.g., when you see an abbreviation like Mr.), and, given how fast people read, two indicators is arguably better than one.  Thus, it is not obvious to me that there’s anything quaint or obsolete about this practice.  Meanwhile, given the sacrifice Mr. Todd made for his students—he lost most of his hearing because he shared a classroom with thirty roaring Selectric typewriters for so many years—I feel compelled to honor him by continuing to put two spaces after a period.

The American Heritage Dictionary

Trevor comments, “Oh, and the American Heritage Dictionary? Total crap. I looked up ‘irregardless’ in it, found it, and then threw it away. ‘Bungled affectation’ is only legitimate if you can successfully defend ‘irregardless.’”  When I quoted this dictionary in my original post, I was almost sure I’d draw Trevor’s scorn, as he’s lambasted this dictionary before.  In terms of eliciting a response, dangling this citation out there was practically entrapment. 

I’d say that before we go picking on this dictionary, we should establish whether or not it’s the sole offender.  I consulted the Webster’s Unabridged Third New International Dictionary and it also defines “irregardless,” however briefly:  “adv [prob. blend of irrespective and regardless] nonstand : REGARDLESS.”

So it looks like Trevor, if he maintains his position, will have to throw out Webster’s too—but I suspect he wouldn’t discredit this noble dictionary, since (I happen to know) Trevor highly regards Vladimir Nabokov, whose favorite dictionary is Webster’s, as described here.  (This discussion, of a barbed public dispute that Nabokov had with the critic Edmund Wilson, reminds me somewhat of this very post, except that for Wilson and Nabokov the stakes were high.  After all, those two actually had readers, and relied on their literary reputations for their livelihood.  In comparison, what you’re reading here is trivial, all in good fun.)

Here is Nabokov with his beloved Webster’s dictionary.  (Not shown:  the word “irregardless,” which is most certainly in there.)

Frankly, I think the American Heritage Dictionary does a much more thorough job than Webster’s does with “irregardless,” by providing a useful commentary about it:

The problem with a dictionary simply leaving the word out is that it leaves arguments unsettled.  Let’s suppose Trevor gets in an argument with some idiot about whether or not “irregardless” is a word, and together they look it up in Webster’s.  The idiot may feel that he has won, because the word is in there, and “nonstand” doesn’t do much to discredit it.  Now suppose they look it up in Trevor’s Oxford English Dictionary and it’s simply not there:  this doesn’t provide closure on the issue, any more than the lack of “artisanal” in my American Heritage Dictionary does.  Isn’t it better to include “irregardless” in order to fully disparage it, rather than just leaving the matter open to endless moot debate?

Conclusion

There’s no real conclusion, of course—there can never be.  I’m sure I’ve left myself vulnerable, in these 3,000 words, to further assaults on my own grammar, rhetoric, and reason.  I don’t have a proofreader, nor the time to scrutinize my work for typos.  There are even logical flaws that I can’t bring myself to fix, like saying “I decided to get Keyser Söze on their ant asses.”  This statement practically begs the reader to say, “Obviously this is an allusion to ‘The Usual Suspects’ and the bit where Keyser Söze’s enemy is holding Söze’s family hostage at gunpoint, and how Söze shoots his own wife and child just to show his opponent how illusory his leverage really is.  But ‘getting Keyser Söze on their ant asses’ is a ridiculous metaphor, as merely eating ants is nowhere near as bold as killing your family, particularly given that eighty percent of the world’s population eats insects on a regular basis.”  (Ha!  Beat you to it!)

There is, however, one more thing I’d like to point out.  You may be under the impression that I consider Trevor an opponent in a verbal “war.”  In fact, that’s not at all the case.  The real opponent is the guy who couldn’t care less about proper language (or worse, the guy who “could care less” about proper language) and who, when confronted with a question of spelling, grammar, or style, simply says, “Whatever.”  Such flaccid, passive word slobs are the real enemy.  Their apathy wages a silent war on our language, with precision, order, and grace all hanging in the balance.

The Grammar Wars

Introduction

I wouldn’t say I pride myself on knowing grammar.  To me, this is a strange thing to be proud of because grammar is simply a set of rules that anybody can learn.  To be a great artist or musician is to contribute something unique to the world, whereas using—and even defending—good grammar ought to be something everybody does.

I notice people’s grammar errors all the time, but almost never point them out.  Sometimes, though, my merciful nature is not observed or appreciated.  For example, a couple decades ago I happened to see the notes a colleague had taken when checking my job references.  She’d interviewed my old bike shop boss, and asked him about my language skills.  “He was always correcting people’s grammar,” my boss had told her.  Maybe he thought he was helping.  I’m lucky this didn’t cost me the job.

The following post concerns a recent debate over correct usage, while delving into some past history to provide context and, I hope, amusement.

The journalists

The other night my wife hosted a dinner party for some old friends from her journalism days.  A couple of them chatted away at the kitchen table while I poured myself a beer at the counter.  “What are you doing?” E— asked.

“I’m pouring a beer,” I said.  The other guest, R—, said, “Yeah, but what’s with the…” (here she mimed how I’d been swishing the beer around in the bottle).

“Well, it’s a Belgian style beer so I’m swishing around the last third of it before pouring it, while chanting my personal mantra,” I replied.  (I wasn’t exactly chanting; it was more of a whisper.)  R— asked what my personal mantra was.  I’m a bit embarrassed by it, so I dodged:  “It’s a brief statement that lasts just the right amount of time, to make sure you swish the beer long enough.  The actual content of the mantra isn’t important.”

“Yes, but what is the content?” she persisted.  Given the natural curiosity of journalists, there was no getting out of it.  I replied, “It’s ‘I … WILL … NOT … LOSE … EVER.’  I guess I say it ironically, because in fact I lose all the time.”

Improper usage

I sat down at the table with the journalists to enjoy my carefully poured beer and some French bread E— had brought.  Though it was good, he apologized that it wasn’t better:  “It’s from Boulange.  I don’t like it as much as” (here he named some bakery I’d never heard of).  “I love their bread because it’s … artistic-y.”

I replied, “I’m glad you said ‘artistic-y.’  I was afraid you were going to say ‘artisanal,’ which isn’t even a word.”  (“Artistic-y” isn’t either, of course, but it’s not pretending to be.)  R— jumped in, “Oh, I hate ‘artisanal’!  Is that true, it’s not a word?  I so want that to be true.”  I replied that it wasn’t in my dictionary. 

(I actually got into some trouble recently over this word.  In a recent blog post I’d written, “I’d be no less astonished if Burger King introduced a grass-fed Kobe beef burger with prosciutto and imported Gruyere on an artisanal semolina bun.”  Of course I should have put “artisanal” in quotation marks to show I was using it ironically.  A cycling pal e-mailed me (cc’ing our bike club), “Cool story. But really artisanal bread.  Hate the word artisanal.  Its so safeway target esque.”  His own poor spelling and punctuation aside, he had a point.  I replied, “True, ‘artisanal’ is a bonehead word, but doesn’t it seem like exactly the term Burger King would use?”)

Since the journalists and I were now on the subject of words we hate, and since I’d had a pent-up desire to vent about it anyway, I brought up my latest pet peeve, which is people pronouncing “processes” with a long “e” at the end, so it sounds like “process-ease.”  I hear this all the time and it rankles.  But E— didn’t agree.  “I’m pretty sure I’ve said ‘process-ease,’” he said carefully.  R— suggested we look it up, and seconds later both E— and R— were pulling out their smartphones.  I cried foul.

“You can’t trust the Internet for such stuff,” I said.  “There are too many pretend Internet facts.  You can support anything that way.  I’ll get a real dictionary.”  I went for my wife’s giant Webster’s Third New International unabridged dictionary.  (I’m embarrassed to say I had to ask where she keeps it.)

E— admired the dictionary, and challenged me to confirm that it’s unabridged.  As I thumbed through it, I said, “We had one of these growing up.  We called it ‘the big dick.’”  (Which is what a person runs the risk of being called if he’s too emphatic about word-related arcana, I privately reminded myself.)  To my horror, this noble dictionary seemed to support “process-ease.”

That “sēz” sure didn’t bode well for me.  I can’t remember exactly what E— said, but it was something like “Read it and weep!”  His triumphant delivery brought to mind Muhammad Ali’s jeer to the journalists who’d doubted him:  “Eat your words!”  E— had vanquished me utterly … or so it seemed.  But before I get to the rest of the story (don’t write off your humble blogger just yet) let’s explore why E— seemed to get such a thrill from proving me wrong.

My scrapper chops

The experience of zealously going toe-to-toe with word-lovers is nothing new to me, and probably not to E— or R— either.  I suppose any logophile will pursue his defense of the language with much vigor, but I doubt that’s the sole reason for E— ’s triumphant tone .  I suppose my recently disclosed personal mantra—“I WILL NOT LOSE EVER”—also came into play.  Indeed, I never expect to lose in such matters, and surely E— and R— could sense this.

Okay, I’ll just say it:  when it comes to grammar, I can be cocky.  For example, I hadn’t hesitated to bash “artisanal,” and my declaration that it’s not a word was kind of a bluff—I’d only ever checked in one dictionary.  (As it turns out, it’s in one of my dictionaries but not the other).  Nor had I paused to consider the possibility that E— and/or R— might routinely say “process-ease” and be offended that I disparaged that pronunciation.  Looking back, I see I was pretty bold in my assertions.  Who wouldn’t want to take me down?

You may be wondering how, if I almost never try to correct people’s grammar, I have such confidence?  Well, there is one important exception to my anti-bashing rule:  for decades I have ruthlessly policed my brother Bryan’s grammar.  It’s reciprocal.  We don’t find fault very often but when we do, we never let it slide.  We do a little dance.  For example, in an online chat Bryan once wrote, “He got his just desserts.”  As you yourself immediately noticed, this is wrong.  I fired back, “Of course what you meant to type was ‘just deserts,’ since it’s from the word ‘deserve,’ having nothing to do with dessert.” There’s an odd procedural form Bryan and I use when we correct each other.  We never say, “You bonehead, that’s bad grammar!”  Instead, we always say “Of course what you meant to say was….”  I think this is to intensify the pain of the barb by being perfectly gentlemanly.

Now, in decades of calling out each other’s grammar errors, neither of us has ever actually defended himself in earnest.  I suppose this is because we are both absolutely certain that the other wouldn’t call out an error unless he was damn sure it was an error.  When Bryan read my “just deserts” comment, he must have immediately grasped that the fact of a bakery called “Just Desserts” doesn’t make the spelling right; it’s a deliberate misspelling in service of a lame pun, like the restaurant “Thai-rrific” or the upstairs barbershop “We’re Up Hair.” 

Naturally, Bryan recognized that defending something like “just desserts” would be rhetorical suicide.  On the other hand, he can’t admit defeat, because I’m his little brother.  (When the tables are turned, I can’t admit defeat either, because I have an English degree and he doesn’t.)  So whenever we’re called out, our response is one of two dodges.  One—and the wording varies so little that I can give this pretty much verbatim—is, “Yes, I know, I was just speaking in the vernacular … you know, coming down to your level.”  The other (which is more appropriate with a misspelling) is, “Yes, I know, I was just testing you, and I’m pleasantly surprised that you passed.”

When I think about it, it’s plain to see that my routine battles with Bryan, coupled with our tradition of denying wrongfulness, surely inflect my overall attitude toward grammar, reinforcing the cockiness I mentioned earlier. 

My “cornered badger” policy

Upon further reflection, I realize that there are a couple more exceptions to my policy of not pointing out grammatical errors.  For one thing, I consider it my duty as a parent to always correct my kids’ mistakes (and if I get a “what-ever” response, there’s a secondary debate about why grammar matters).  In addition, I can be ruthless when somebody tries to “correct” me when I’m not actually wrong.  Since, in this situation, I can’t be seen as a bully, nor can I be faulted for undue linguistic precision, I take such challenges as an invitation—as a mandate, even—to defend myself.

Here’s an example.  Back in the ‘80s, my friends and I had a dinner party where we met one guy’s new girlfriend for the first time.  I liked her well enough I guess, until she committed what I considered a major gaffe.  I’d said to the group, “There’s ice cream for whoever wants it,” and she interjected, “You mean ‘There’s ice cream for whomever wants it.’” 

That she was rude, and wrong, was bad enough, but the nature of her attempted correction made things worse.  In my opinion, using “whom” where “who” is called for is the worst kind of blunder.  If somebody makes the inverse mistake, using “who” where “whom” is called for, he or she is either making a very understandable error (after all, “who” vs. “whom” is complicated) or might be deliberately using incorrect grammar to avoid seeming stodgy and punctilious.  I myself have occasionally avoided “whom” even when it’s the correct word, so as to not alienate somebody (for example, a work contact known for his highly approximate grammatical usage).  When I hear an erroneous “who” or “whoever” I’ll never call the speaker out on it, unless it’s my brother or one of my kids.  Thus, when I use “who” or “whoever” correctly, and then somebody displays a toxic blend of ignorance and gall in telling me I’m wrong, I come out with both barrels blazing.

I walked the girlfriend through the grammar.  “Look, ‘whoever’ is the subject of its clause, and ‘whomever’ would be used only if it were the object.”  She fired back, “But you wouldn’t say, ‘I gave ice cream to whoever.’”  Yes, I acknowledged, but that’s because “whomever” in that sentence would be the object of a preposition, whereas in my sentence, “whoever” is the subject, and the whole clause “whoever wants it” acts (collectively) as the object of the preposition.  (To be honest, I’m not even sure “to whomever” would ever be right … but no matter.)

The girlfriend realized her error, and—to her credit—admitted it.  But she continued to defend herself:  “I only got that wrong because I never actually learned grammar, like, you know, from a book.”  Here’s where I think I’ve matured:  today, I would leave it at that.  But back then, being a belligerent teen, I feigned surprise:  “You mean you were born knowing this stuff?  That’s impressive.  I was born without any language skills at all, and had to learn everything I know.”  Yes, this was a lot snottier than she deserved.  (It didn’t end up mattering, because she didn’t date my friend very long.  Either she was a psycho or he was a jerk, depending on whose side you took.  Probably they were both right.)

Back to “process-ease”

And now it’s time for the rest of the story.

As I stared in disbelief at the pronunciation guide for “process” in the Webster’s dictionary, E— took a victory lap by seeking further corroboration online.  I decided to further investigate the notation in my Webster’s:  “sometimes ÷|,se(,)sēz.”  The “sometimes” didn’t help much, but what was this division symbol?  I cursed myself for never figuring out how to use a proper dictionary, and flipped through the thick tome’s opening pages looking for “÷.”  Finally I found it and was richly rewarded:

“Aha!” I cried.  “The division sign indicates that many regard as unacceptable the pronunciation that follows!”  As I prepared to parlay this finding into full redemption, E— suddenly discovered, online, a very germane discourse on “process-ease” by a guy named Bernie Zimmerman.  At first this blurb seemed to validate E—’s position.  “Listen,” E— said, “‘To this day [process-ease] still sounds strange to me, but the more I hear it in everyday use, the less I feel confident about the way I've always pronounced it, which is similar to the way I pronounce the last syllable of the word glasses.’”  E— seemed to be on the way to scoring another point.  “I don’t like this Zimmerman guy,” I said.

But then E— scanned further down on his screen and said, “Whoah, what’s this?  ‘In recent years there has been a tendency to pronounce the plural ending -es of processes as “-ēz,” perhaps by analogy with words of Greek origin such as analysis and neurosis. But process is not of Greek origin, and there is no etymological justification for this pronunciation of its plural.”  By this point we were all cackling with pleasure, nerds that we are.  E— read on, “However, because this pronunciation is not uncommon even in educated speech, it is generally considered an acceptable variant, although it still strikes some listeners as a bungled affectation.”  (Italics his.  Well, sort of his.  They’re my attempt at conveying the emphatic delight with which he read that phrase).

I knew at once that this last statement had won E— and R— over to the traditional pronunciation of “processes.”  You can always count on a word-lover to prize accuracy over simply prevailing in a dispute.  For a moment I felt vindicated.  “Actually, I think I like this Zimmerman guy!” I said.  E— replied, “Well, he’s actually quoting Answers.com here.”

D’oh!  No matter how persuasive the “bungled affectation” argument was, I’d already expressed my misgivings about “pretend Internet facts.”  As I hadn’t intended to regard Internet research as admissible, I couldn’t very well cite Answers.com just because it happened to agree with me.  I needed something more.  So I decided to consult my (software-based) American Heritage Dictionary, because it has lots of usage notes on debated word forms, and maybe, just maybe, would include a useful commentary about “process-ease.”  This was a Hail Mary, but I felt it was all I had.

Here’s what this dictionary shows for pronunciation of “processes”:

Needless to say this isn’t very helpful.  Probably owing to compatibility issues between MS-DOS and Windows, the special characters look like an excerpt from a book about bridge, or a collection of ‘70s pendants.  The presence of two different plural pronunciations did worry me.

Scrolling down, I was glad to find this very compelling usage note:

Look familiar?  In this instance, Answers.com was quoting directly from the American Heritage Dictionary.  Thus, with the legitimacy of the “bungled affectation” zinger no longer in question, my redemption was complete.  I can now safely assume that neither E— nor R— will be saying “process-ease” anymore … and that’s really all I ever wanted.  That and some playfully barbed banter with people who care about words.

By the way, if you feel like defending “process-ease” yourself, feel free to comment below or e-mail me.  Since it’s not your grammar in question here, I think I can engage you in a debate without violating my policy of ignoring people’s grammatical errors.  In other words, BRING IT!

Update

Be sure to check out the comments below, and click here for my rebuttal to them.