A week’s worth of words
SO many wordrelated events happened in one recent week that I kept a diary.
Saturday: Reading music
I’ve been sitting in on my grandson’s recorder class. Often the emphasis falls on reading
music. In that, a lot happens at once: notes, clef, stave, barlines, timesignature, repeatsign, where to rest or breathe. The littluns need to know words and numerals, as they move into fresh symbols and their system. It fascinates me, how the teacher communicates the new skill. Beautiful moment when, using the new language, and with firm piano guidance they tootled out the BAG of ‘‘Old MacDonald had a farm’’, without any wrong notes or squeaking. They had begun to make music.
Sunday: Programme notes
Another musical language, reading the programme notes for a recital. They spoke of Mozart’s ‘‘pert repartee’’ between violin and piano, and their ‘‘witty exchanges’’. Elsewhere ‘‘the sense of quiet conversation never ceases’’. Yes, though Mozart’s music is ordered beauty and strong feeling, and maths too, it does resemble good talking. He does your mind good, they say — and even your eyesight, because an ad in the programme claimed: ‘‘Just by listening to 10 minutes of his Sonata for two Pianos in D Major, subjects in a Brazilian student group were able to provide more reliable results in a test of their peripheral vision’’. See if it works outside Brazil. YouTube K 448.
Monday: Daytime job
I was preparing a talk about my research, on John Milton and his erstwhile colleague John Dryden. While Milton never lacked money, and showed the indifference to it which comes from always having it, Dryden had ups and downs — he overinvested in theatre productions. I had an idea: next time I want a break from Milton, might I look at the money troubles of great writers? It’s a curious detail of the New Oxford Dictionary of National Biography that each entry closes by stating the figures in that person’s will.
Tuesday: Computerwriting
Another lapse in my computing skills! I left off the suffix /.docx/ from a file sent to the ODT. The receiving computer needs the suffix to recognize what’s coming in. Computers, like humans, need to know context.
Wednesday: That apostrophe
A phone caller from the wonderful Amenities Society, reediting its brochure of walks in the Town Belt, had been asked if The Queen’s View should be spelt ‘‘The Queens View’’. I thought not. It’s the view which was named after HM QE II, in 1954, but still the reigning monarch. Contrast Queens Drive nearby. If it was once Q Victoria’s on the same basis, it has lost its /’/ and the /the/. Long usage turns it into pure place, without a sense of commemoration.
Thursday: Launchtime one
Dunedin Public Libraries is celebrating 70 years of its magnificent Reed Collection of books, manuscripts, letters, and papers. At the launch, Mary Ronnie reminisced about
A.H. Reed, its walkative founder; a familiar figure, into his 90s. An affectionate and moving talk.
Friday: Launchtime two
Next day, I attended the launch of the latest University Library exhibition, ‘‘A MiddleEastern Odyssey’’; books by travellers to countries between Turkey, Egypt, and Persia. How well they write! Is it the startling newness of the other? Does newness still work for tourists and journalists, going to ever new places? Or do we now carry too many prior images and their preconceived ideas?
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