When letters get in the wrong place

It will come as no surprise to readers that spelling is not one of my strongest attributes. I stand firmly alongside AA Milne’s Winnie the Pooh when the bear admits: “My spelling is wobbly. It’s good spelling, but it wobbles and the letters get in the wrong place.” I know the feeling well. I admit to regularly using the traditional “I before E except after C” rhyming rule, although admittedly there are many exceptions. And I still struggle over whether certain words may have have two “N”s, two “R”s or two “C”s.

So it was with some interest that I started reading a report from a survey by the Oxford University Press about the 20 most commonly misspelt words in the English language.

Topping the list is “separate” with many using an “E” instead of the “A”. I suspect I’ve committed that crime many times. Second on the list is “definitely”, with an “A” mistakenly being used instead of the second “I”. In both cases, people tend to spell the words how they pronounce them. Making the podium in third place is “manoeuvre”, the positioning of “O” and “E” causing considerable confusion.

For the curious, rounding off the top 10 in difficulty are “embarrass”, “occurrence”, “consensus”, “unnecessary”, “acceptable”, “broccoli” and “referred”. Also worthy of mention is No 15 which is actually two words, “a lot”. Apparently these days it is common for people to make it one word.

One word I’m surprised that didn’t make the list is “diarrhoea”. However, it did get an honorary mention. Apparently one third of the people in the survey couldn’t even spell it close enough to the correct version for the spellchecker to recognise what word they were really after.

More bad language

The English language is an absolute minefield, especially punctuation. Thank goodness we don’t have to use punctuation marks when we speak — conversations would get very complicated.

Apart from apostrophes, which seem to be increasingly ignored these days, we are in a daily skirmish with commas, colons, semi-colons, exclamation marks, question marks, quotation marks, dashes, hyphens, brackets and weird things I’ve never even heard of.

Arguments over grammar can take its toll on authors, too. When US crimewriter Raymond Chandler was upset with the editing of one of his books, he sent an angry response to the publisher: “When I split an infinitive, God damn it, I split it so it stays split.”

Winston Churchill also had an issue with an editor who had changed one of his sentences to avoid it ending in a preposition. Churchill was not amused and in a note replied: “This is the sort of bloody nonsense up with which I will not put.”

The wicked spellchecker

Spelling errors are the bane of newspapers and sometimes spellcheckers even add to the confusion if the subeditors are feeling a bit weary.

Hence the splendid explanation by the Guardian: “In our report the computer spellchecker did not recognise the term WNO (Welsh National Opera). A slip of the finger caused it to be replaced by the word ‘winos’.”

Then there was the Leamington Spa newspaper that had to explain to concerned readers that the meal they reported being served at a kindergarten should have read “chicken casserole” and not “children casserole”.

All it takes is one letter out of place to change the meaning of a story.

Thus, The Kent Messenger reported the moment when “the bride got very upset when one of her little attendants stepped on her brain and tore it”.

The curse of a missing letter struck in this item from the Baltimore Sun: “The new bride is approximately five metres wide from buttress to buttress.”

What we meant to say was …

Newspaper corrections are frequently a source of great mirth for some and embarrassment for others. Pupils at one school no doubt got a giggle from: “Due to a printing error a story in last week’s Gazette referred to athletics coach Bill Hodgins as an ‘old waster’. This should of course read ‘old master’.”

You have to be particularly careful with beauty pageants as the Stockport Advertiser discovered: “In a recent report held at one of Pontins holiday camps it was inadvertently stated that it was for ‘elephant’ grandmothers instead of ‘elegant’ grandmothers.”

Then there was an Irish paper which clarified: “A report yesterday should have stated that Cardinal Conway’s use of the word ‘horizon’ was prophetic. Because of a mishearing the word used was ‘pathetic’.”

Cup of woe

Some words seem to be particularly vulnerable to slip-ups as The South London Press discovered with the following report: “The strike leaders had called a meeting that was to have been held in a bra near the factory, but it was too small to hold them.”

Bras certainly have a lot to answer for in the world’s press. A Methodist Recorder report informed readers: “The speaker told of her perilous experience with a bra constrictor.”

Then we have the Glasgow Herald telling us: “The landlord insisted that no female be allowed in the bra without a man.”

Matter of taste

Finally a delightful report from a Leicestershire parish magazine on a wine-tasting contest which could have perhaps been better expressed: “Winners in the homemade claret section were Mrs Davis [fruity, well rounded], Mrs Rayner [fine colour and full-bodied] and Miss Ogle-Smith [slightly acid, but should improve if laid down].” Contact PostScript via email at oldcrutch@gmail.com PRINTED AND DISTRIBUTED BY PRESSREADER