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Breaking The Spell - An Appeal To Common Sense
Breaking The Spell - An Appeal To Common Sense Author:Various PREFACE SPELLING should be the simplest of all arts as easy as A, B, C t with nothing to remember but the names, or sounds, of the letters and, for reading, their shapes, or appearance. In some living languages Spanish, Italian, Welsh, Dutch and in dead Greek and Latin if properly taught reading and spelling are as easy as that. But English a to... more »ngue in the simple spelling of which one quarter at least of the human race is directly interested, and the rest would gladly learn to spell it if they cotdd English, ivith its grammar the simplest, with its vocabulary the richest of living languages presents in its ortho- graphy, or orthodox spelling, a mass and maze of anomalies and difficulties, which make the acquisi- tion of the correct pronunciation and the conventional spelling an insoluble problem to native and foreigner alike. The majority of our own people never acquire mastery of the language. Even the educated man of business writes with a dictionary at his elbow. Correct spelling and pronunciation are the aristo- cratic privilege of the few. The orthodox spelling of English has, in course of time, owing to well known historical causes and for want of authoritative read- justment to the unconscious but inevitable changes always at work in pronunciation, come to have so little relation to the audible speech that every man, woman, child, who would fain read, write, and speak a tolerable English must set out to learn two distinct and independent languages the one, English as spoken the other, English as printed. Our spelling has become a mystery, a convention, without rules or reason a constant exercise of memory, a constant recourse to the dictionary, a perpetual setting of conundrums, a tiresome game of hide and seek, an exasperating waste of time and material and energy, which might be very much better employed. No mortal can tell at sight how an English word is to be pronounced, nor how to write an English word, heard for the first time. The chaos of English orthography is unscientific, inartistic, unbusinesslike and every competent judge, be his interests educational, or scholarly, or simply commercial be he teacher, or student, or manufacturer and merchant, is in favour of reform. Why, then, tarry the wheels of the Reform-chariot Every attempt at reform, in this department, en- counters two tremendous obstacles. In the first place, spelling rejormers are up against the apathy, the ignorance, and the prejudice of the adult popUlation, the grown-ups, educated or semi-educated. Those who have acquired the technical trick of spell- ing, and forgotten, or never considered, what their proficiency has cost them, are apt to say, with becom- ing modesty, that what they have done others can do likewise are apt to protest, having learnt to spell after one fashion, against being asked to unlearn the lesson and start afresh are apt to declare that, to re- print English prose and poetry in a new fashion, how- ever simple and scientific, would destroy for them all the charm of reading and all facility of writing the language. They will seldom consider the educational interests of the rising generation, or the commercial interests of the nation, twenty years hence. Having no desire or intention to amend their own way of spelling, they fail to appreciate the damnosa here- ditas the costly and ruinous legacy they queathing children. are be- to their children and their childrens The educational argument for a reform of our spelling ought alone to carry the day...« less