quote:

Originally posted by Crazyhorseconsulting:
Sciptus, what are you trying to say and please use normal English this time.

For those English Majors viewing the AR Forums, Please, do yourselves a favor and stop worrying about how people spell or use punctuation and just enjoy the site.

We are not in school, and no one put you folks in charge of giving any of us grades on our writing skills or lack there of.

Also, it might help if some of you did not use internet anonimity to try and act like psychiatrists, it ain't working out real well for those of you that keep trying it.

quote:

It appears that some lacking in certain skills are reduced to feculent arguement.

quote:

Originally posted by Crazyhorseconsulting:
No Sir, what you wrote is South African English, Fecal is spelled Fecal, not Faecal.

quote:

Originally posted by Crazyhorseconsulting:

quote:

It appears that some lacking in certain skills are reduced to feculent arguement.

It appears that some people believe they are better and comprehend things on a higher plane than others.

They are laboring under a false sense of self worth and knowledge.

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I have yet to meet any knowledgeable person who in any manner labours under a sense of false worth.

quote:

Originally posted by MJines:
Lorenzo, your English is outstanding. It is some of the folks who profess to have English as their first language that I am worried about.

quote:

Originally posted by MJines:
I guess I just have a low tolerance threshold for ignorance. To that end, I will leave you to rant. A word of advice, sometimes it is better to be silent and thought a fool than to open your mouth (or in this case your keyboard) and confirm it.

quote:

FAMOUS BAD SPELLERS

Winston Churchill, Richard Branson, John Lennon, Albert Einstein, Thomas Edison, Picasso, Jackie Stewart, Agatha Christie, Leonardo Da Vinci, Michael Faraday, Henry Ford, Ted Turner, Walt Disney, Harrison Ford, John F. Kennedy, Orlando Bloom, Enrico Caruso and an estimated one out of five people on the planet have one thing in common............

http://www.authorsden.com/visi...Article.asp?id=19984

quote:

http://www.dyslexiaandlearning...ions.com/gpage5.html

Famous People with the Gift of Dyslexia
Dyslexia.com Home Page

Here are the names of some of the many individuals who are dyslexic, or had symptoms of dyslexia or related learning problems:

Actors & Entertainers:

* Harry Anderson
* Orlando Bloom
* Harry Belafonte
* Tom Cruise
* Dave Foley
* Danny Glover
* Whoopi Goldberg
* Susan Hampshire
* Jay Leno
* Keanu Reeves.
* Kiera Knightley
* Edward James Olmos
* Oliver Reed.
* Billy Bob Thornton.
* Tom Smothers
* Robin Williams
* Henry Winkler
* Loretta Young

Artists, Designers, & Architects:

* Ansel Adams, Photographer.
* David Bailey, Photographer.
* Leonardo da Vinci.
* Ignacio Gomez, Muralist.
* Tommy Hilfiger, Clothing Designer.
* Ian Marley, Contemporary Artist, South Africa.
* Pablo Picasso.
* Robert Rauschenberg.
* Auguste Rodin.
* Bennett Strahan
* Robert Toth
* Jørn Utzon (architect, designed Sydney Opera house)
* Andy Warhol.

Athletes:

* Muhammad Ali, World Heavyweight Champion Boxer
* Duncan Goodhew, Olympic Swimmer
* Bruce Jenner, Olympic Decathlon Gold Medalist
* Magic Johnson
* Greg Louganis
* Bob May, golfer.
* Diamond Dallas Page, World Wrestling Champion.
* Steve Redgrave, Olympic Gold Medalist (rowing).
* Nolan Ryan, Baseball Pitcher.
* Jackie Stewart, race car driver.

Entrepreneurs & Business Leaders:

* Richard Branson,Founder of Virgin Enterprises.
* John T Chambers,CEO of Cisco Systems.
* Henry Ford.
* William Hewlett, Co-Founder, Hewlett-Packard.
* Craig McCaw, Telecommunications Visionary.
* O.D. McKee, founder of McKee Foods.
* David Neeleman, CEO of jetBlue Airways.
* Paul J. Orfalea, founder of Kinko's.
* Charles Schwab, Investor.
* Ted Turner, President, Turner Broadcasting Systems.
* F.W. Woolworth

Filmmakers:

* Robert Benton.
* Nicole Betancourt, Emmy-winning filmmaker.
* Walt Disney.
* Søren KraghJacobsen (Danish film director).


Inventors & Scientists:

* Ann Bancroft, Arctic Explorer.
* Alexander Graham Bell.
* John Britten, Inventor.
* Thomas Edison.
* Albert Einstein
* Michael Faraday.
* Dr. James Lovelock.
* Willem Hollenbach, astronomical photographer and inventor.
* John R. Horner, Paleontologist.
* Paul MacCready "Engineer of the Century."
* Archer Martin, Chemist (1952 Nobel Laureate)
* Pierre Curie, Physicist (1903 Nobel Prize).
* John Robert Skoyles, Brain Researcher.
* Werner Von Braun

Law & Justice:

* David Boies, Attorney.
* Erin Brockovich, Investigator.
* Jeffrey H. Gallet, Judge.

Military Heroes:

* Thomas Jonathan "Stonewall" Jackson.
* George Patton.

Musicians & Vocalists:

* Cher.
* Brad Little.
* John Lennon.
* Nigel Kennedy, Violinist.
* Bob Weir, Grateful Dead Guitarist.

Physicians & Surgeons

* Harvey Cushing, Surgeon.
* Fred Epstein,Neurosurgeon.

Political Leaders:

* Winston Churchill.
* King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden.
* Michael Heseltine.
* Andrew Jackson.
* Thomas Jefferson.
* John F. Kennedy.
* Gavin Newsom, Mayor of San Francisco.
* Nelson Rockefeller.
* Paul Wellstone,U.S. Senator.
* Woodrow Wilson.
* George Washington.

Writers:

* Scott Adams, Cartoonist (Dilbert)
* Hans Christian Andersen
* Avi
* Jeanne Betancourt, (Author of "My Name is Brain Brian").
* Steven Cannell, television writer & novelist.
* John Corrigan, novelist..
* Larry Chambers.
* Andrew Dornenburg, award-winning author and chef.
* Agatha Christie.
* Fannie Flagg (Author of "Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe").
* F. Scott Fitzgerald.
* Gustave Flaubert.
* Terry Goodkind fantasy writer, author of The Sword of Truth series.
* Patricia Polacco, Children's Author and Illustrator.
* Eileen Simpson (Author of "Reversals").
* Elizabeth Daniels Squire(author of mystery novels).
* Bernie Taylor, author of Biological Time.
* Victor Villaseñor
* W.B. Yeats

Famous Dyslexics: What They Remember about School

I hated school . . . . One of the reasons was a learning disability, dyslexia, which no one understood at the time. I still can't spell . . .
--Loretta Young

I was one of the 'puzzle children' myself -- a dyslexic . . . And I still have a hard time reading today. Accept the fact that you have a problem. Refuse to feel sorry for yourself. You have a challenge; never quit!
--Nelson Rockefeller

I never read in school. I got really bad grades--D's and F's and C's in some classes, and A's and B's in other classes. In the second week of the 11th grade, I just quit. When I was in school, it was really difficult. Almost everything I learned, I had to learn by listening. My report cards always said that I was not living up to my potential.
--Cher

When I had dyslexia, they didn't diagnose it as that. It was frustrating and embarrassing. I could tell you a lot of horror stories about what you feel like on the inside.
--Nolan Ryan

Having made a strenuous effort to understand the symbols he could make nothing of, he wept giant tears . . .
--Caroline Commanville, on her uncle, Gustave Flaubert

I was, on the whole, considerably discouraged by my school days. It was not pleasant to feel oneself so completely outclassed and left behind at the beginning of the race.
--Winston Churchill

He told me that his teachers reported that . . . he was mentally slow, unsociable, and adrift forever in his foolish dreams.
--Hans Albert Einstein, on his father, Albert Einstein

I, myself, was always recognized . . . as the "slow one" in the family. It was quite true, and I knew it and accepted it. Writing and spelling were always terribly difficult for me. My letters were without originality. I was . . . an extraordinarily bad speller and have remained so until this day.
--Agatha Christie

My teachers say I'm addled . . . my father thought I was stupid, and I almost decided I must be a dunce.
--Thomas Edison

My father was an angry and impatient teacher and flung the reading book at my head.
--W.B. Yeats

Willie was sent to lessons in spelling and grammar, but he never learned to spell. To the end of his life he produced highly idiosyncratic versions of words.
--Biographer A. Norman Jeffares on William Butler Yeats

I grew up in a school system . . . where nobody understood the meaning of learning disorder. In the West Indies, I was constantly being physically abused because the whipping of students was permitted.
--Harry Belafonte

Since I was the stupidest kid in my class, it never occurred to me to try and be perfect, so I've always been happy as a writer just to entertain myself. That's an easier place to start.
--Stephen J. Cannell, screenwriter, producer, & director

I had to train myself to focus my attention. I became very visual and learned how to create mental images in order to comprehend what I read."
--Tom Cruise

You should prefer a good scientist without literary abilities than a literate one without scientific skills.
--Leonardo da Vinci

Kids made fun of me because I was dark skinned, had a wide nose, and was dyslexic. Even as an actor, it took me a long time to realize why words and letters got jumbled in my mind and came out differently.
--Danny Glover, actor

I barely made it through school. I read real slow. But I like to find things that nobody else has found, like a dinosaur egg that has an embryo inside. Well, there are 36 of them in the world, and I found 35.
--Dr. John R. Horner, American paleontologist

I am, myself, a very poor visualizer and find that I can seldom call to mind even a single letter of the alphabet in purely retinal terms. I must trace the letter by running my mental eye over its contour in order that the image of it shall leave any distinctness at all.
--William James, psychologist and philosopher

I just barely got through school. The problem was a learning disability, at a time when there was nowhere to get help.
--Bruce Jenner, Olympic gold medalist

The looks, the stares, the giggles . . . I wanted to show everybody that I could do better and also that I could read.
--Magic Johnson

Young George . . . although he was bright and intelligent and bursting with energy, he was unable to read and write. Patton's wife corrected his spelling, his punctuation, and his grammar.
--Biographer Martin Blumenson on General George Patton

I couldn't read. I just scraped by. My solution back then was to read classic comic books because I could figure them out from the context of the pictures. Now I listen to books on tape.
--Charles Schwabb

My problem was reading very slowly. My parents said "Take as long as you need. As long as you're going to read, just keep at it." We didn't know about learning disabilities back then.
--Roger Wilkins, Head of the Pulitzer Prize Board

As a child, I was called stupid and lazy. On the SAT I got 159 out of 800 in math. My parents had no idea that I had a learning disability.
--Henry Winkler

quote:

http://www.spellingdearest.com/wst_page7.html



Sample Interview / Frequently Asked Questions...

Why the title Spelling Dearest?


Our children are being beaten up by a crazy spelling system that appears to them to be loved by millions. The similarity to Joan Crawford beating her children in Mommy Dearest was unavoidable.



What do you mean our kids are being beaten up by a crazy spelling system?


They are being beaten up because they are constantly bombarded by unpredictable silent letters, double consonants that defy explanation, endless varieties of vowel combinations, demon words that fit no heavenly or earthly pattern, and rules that are notoriously unreliable. Our kids are forced to attempt to learn a system that is illogical, inconsistent, and — worst of all — needlessly complicated. They are not being physically beaten up, but many of them do end up with well-concealed scars on their psyches. Over and above the inferiority and the feeling of failure that this spelling system breeds, at least one study has shown that using a system as irrational as ours may arrest the development of logical thinking. That's not just being beating up; it's child abuse in my opinion.

Are bad spellers the only ones being beaten up by the English-spelling system?


No, even good spellers are suffering. At school they are forced to spend countless hours per week on a system they will probably never fully master. Only about five percent of the population ever becomes completely proficient at English spelling. The rest of us develop coping skills and character.



What is Spelling Dearest about?


It's about the meandering and often unguided history of English spelling, and how the lack of common-sense controls has affected our spelling today. It's about the mistakes, missed opportunities, and misjudgments that were made by the key people involved. The book also touches upon how a complicated spelling system such as ours creates functional illiterates. In a nutshell, it's about looking down on a system that up until now has looked down on us.



Does English spelling create functional illiterates?


Most definitely. Literacy organizations have been screaming this from the rooftops for decades. Germany and Finland have simple spelling systems, and they have about half the number of functional illiterates as English-speaking countries. Common sense tells us if we have a writing system that requires a high degree of code-breaking skills to decipher, then a good portion of the population (who do not have these advanced skills) will have trouble understanding it. A confusing spelling system may seem relatively harmless in isolation but it's what happens behind the scenes — it's what happens behind the eyes of that innocent child who's trying to make sense of it — where the real damage occurs. Complex spelling is only the bullet holes in our writing system; functional illiterates and stunted logical thinkers are the exit wounds.



How does learning to read in English compare to learning to read in other languages?


It takes about 4 months, 2 hours a day to teach a Russian child how to read and write Russian. It takes 5 years longer than that to teach an English-speaking child to read and write English to the same level. Thankfully for us, nuclear weaponry, strategic military planning, and international espionage proved a little harder for the Russians to master; otherwise they'd have won the Cold War with all that free time they had on their hands.



The Dictionary of Simplified American Spelling says this about learning to read in English: "Written Spanish helps one learn Spanish. Written English only confuses the learner." I can't put it any better than that.



Why did you write a book about the history of English spelling?


To answer my children's questions: "Daddy, why is spelling so difficult? Daddy, where do difficult spellings come from? Daddy, why are there 19 ways to spell the sh-sound?" You have to know the whole history to come close to answering these questions. No one incident, or one short sentence, can explain all the ridiculousness inherent in this system. To understand a country you have to understand the history behind that country. Likewise, to understand a spelling system like ours, you have to know about the decisions that were made and the wars that were waged. Not to mention the post-traumatic stress syndrome and collateral damage that have resulted from these decisions and wars. That's where Spelling Dearest comes in.



Where do difficult spellings come from?


For specifics, you have to read the book. Generally, they come from every conceivable place on the planet. They come from dank and dingy corners of complex and confused minds. They come from anywhere and everywhere imaginable, and some places you'd never dream of. If nothing else, the English spelling system is creative in its complexity. Creativity is commendable for surrealistic paintings and blank-verse poetry, but a sprinkling of down-home logic would be more appropriate for a spelling system.



It's interesting to hear you say that the English-spelling system is creative. Bad spellers are usually contemptuously called creative.


That's true. In reality, though, bad spellers are normally being more logical than the system they are working with. They are generally trying to simplify things or follow a pattern that should be there already. It's ironic; our spelling system is the ridicule of the non-English-speaking world, yet we ridicule the ones amongst us who are attempting to make it less ridiculous! How absurd is that?

You said English spelling is the ridicule of the non- English-speaking world. Is this true?


Oh my God, yes. English spelling is by far the worst alphabetical spelling system in the world. Perfectly normal people who learn English as a second language think they have suddenly developed dyslexia when they first try to read in English. All the letters seem to be rearranged in places they shouldn't be. Our spelling is so illogical that new learners can't even find some of the words they are looking for in the dictionary. They think it ludicrous that we have special bad-speller's dictionaries that tell us the correct spellings so we can then look up the meanings in the real dictionaries. The English spelling system should be ridiculed. It's an embarrassment to us all. It is the alcoholic, butt-scratching brother of the otherwise universally admired English language.



How complex is English spelling compared to the spelling of other languages?


Extremely. In Finland, Germany, Spain, and many other countries, they don't even have spelling books in school because their spelling systems are so easy to learn, yet in English-speaking counties we still teach spelling at university! If you rounded up a bunch of Finnish people and told them they were going to be tested on their Finnish-spelling ability, they would laugh. It is almost impossible to spell a word wrongly in that language once you learn the simple spelling of each sound. Round up a bunch of English-speaking people, take away their computer spell-checkers and their Franklin electronic dictionaries, and tell them they are going to be tested on their English-spelling ability, and they will quickly have an urgent meeting to go to. That meeting, by the way, will have a secretary — sworn to secrecy — who deciphers the minutes.



What is the purpose of Spelling Dearest?


Firstly to inform. This is an intriguing subject that is largely untapped. There are literally hundreds of books on the history of the English Language, yet only a few on the history of English spelling. Spelling Dearest fills an important general-knowledge gap. It bridges the void between the limited information provided by the main-stream English language books and the in-depth academic details offered by the university publications.



The second purpose of Spelling Dearest is to entertain. It takes a playful approach to presenting information, rather than a sterile delivery of hard facts. The idea is to deliver this important subject matter to as large an audience as possible, while at the same time providing fresh particulars and interpretations for the more academic-minded.



The third purpose of the book is to arm people against ridicule. Now when a person makes a spelling mistake, all he or she has to do is pull out a copy of Spelling Dearest and say: "Here, read this, then come back and tell me that my mistake was worse than any of the mistakes or misjudgments that were made on the long and rocky road that got us into this mess in the first place."





Aren't you letting people off the hook by allowing them to blame the history and the system for the mistakes they make?








Not at all. I agree that too many people today blame other people and factors for their mistakes. Someone fights their way through the flames emitting from a cup of coffee to burn their lips, and nowadays that's not their fault. In reality, though, spelling mistakes are the one thing that people still blame themselves for. They do this because they don't realize how complex and illogical our spelling system is. A spelling error is the one situation where other elements do play a large part in the mistake. It's important that poor spellers, good spellers, educators, and the people who can change things know this. For people to take total responsibility for every spelling mistake they make is the biggest spelling mistake they will ever make.



What makes Spelling Dearest unique?






The book focuses on the people more than the events. It lays a great deal of the blame for our system's complexity at the feet of the important individuals who missed the opportunity to fix it. The character and personality of these famous individuals, in relation to their choice of spelling, is always an issue.



In addition to the main text, many historical documents, such as the Declaration of Independence and works by William Shakespeare and Jonathan Swift, are used to illustrate the spelling at different times in the history. Similarly, illustrative charts give examples of how specific words were spelled throughout the centuries.



Spelling Dearest also has one pen and ink caricature for the major historical personality in every chapter of the book. These caricatures allow readers who have been adversely affected by English spelling to sketch horns and missing teeth on their least favorite personality. Hell has no fury like a bad speller scorned! Sketching materials not included.



Tell me one of the "dirty little secrets" about English Spelling.






In 16th century England, lawyers and their clerks added extra letters to words because they were paid by the length of their documents. No one knows for sure whether adding these surplus letters has affected the spelling we have today, but it certainly contributed to the tumultuous spelling in the 16th century. These individuals also spaced lines ridiculously far apart and created huge margins to elongate their manuscripts, so there's little doubt about what they were up to. Lucky for them they weren't paid by the shortness of their integrity or they'd have gone bankrupt! And the legal profession wonders why it gets the reputation for being money-grabbing!



What is the absolute worst thing that has happened to our spelling system?


The worst thing that has ever happened to our spelling system is something that has never actually happened. Our spelling system has never had a Language Academy to control it. A Language Academy is an institution that has the supreme authority to say: this is the way it will be, this is what we will do with new or foreign words, this is the law according to logic. The French and Italian Academies have made the languages they control much easier to read and spell since their inception. Our spelling, on the other hand, has been generally controlled by a bunch of relatively uncontrolled tradespeople such as monks, scribes, and printers. If we had a Language Academy with ultimate authority, a rigid backbone, and a desire for improvement, we would have 50% fewer functional illiterates; less stressful students and teachers; no spelling books; no phonetic re-spellings in dictionaries; and — best of all — no more spelling bees on prime-time television. If I want to watch someone sweat over the spelling of a word, I can watch teenagers filling out job application forms at Home Depot stores.

Now that you mentioned them, what do you think of spelling bees?


Don't ask me about spelling bees. Ask someone from Finland — where they have an extremely simple spelling system — what they think of spelling bees. They will look puzzled no matter how you try to explain them. To Finns, competing in a spelling bee would be like competing in a breathing contest — everybody in Finland who has a pulse can do it, with world-class precision!



One thing I will say about spelling bees, though, is they show how difficult English spelling is to master; all but the very last person standing makes a mistake. And the people who fail in the competition are the very best that the English-speaking world has to offer. Bad spellers love spelling bees because good spellers get to mess up in front of millions of people. That, I suspect, is why they're so popular on prime-time television.

When was the worst period in English spelling's history?


That has got to be the 16th century. That century is by far the biggest chapter in Spelling Dearest. So much went on then to scramble even further all the egg on the chin of the English language. In the 16th century we had good scribes with a stabilizing spelling system that was very un-phonetic; we had bad scribes with unstable spelling systems that were even more un-phonetic; we had good and bad printers with stable and unstable spelling systems that were very un-phonetic; we had multiple scribes and typesetters with their individual spelling styles working on the same books; we had scribes and typesetters copying the irregular spelling of the manuscripts they were duplicating; we had great freedom in the spelling of vowel sounds; we had few or no rules for anyone to follow; we had variant spellings for many of the words that were reasonably stable; we had words entering English from over 50 languages; we had foreign influence on English spelling; we had the Great Vowel Shift and a few other specialized absurdities such as justification, elongated Latinization, and false etymology. We also, incidentally, had the first English book calling for spelling reform — and no wonder. A person would have to be deaf, dumb, and have their eyes poked out by a fondue skewer to miss that something was wrong in the 16th century. Apparently, there were many people like that, though, because the 16th century was not followed by a period of simplicity; it was followed by a period of stability. Instead of ridding ourselves of the obvious dysfunction of the 16th century, we cemented 16th-century spelling in place and have barely changed a thing since then. It could be said that the Old-English period was English-spelling's traumatic birth, and Middle English was its troubled childhood. If this is true, the 16th century has got to go down in history as its pimply, uncoordinated adolescence. An adolescence that it's never been allowed to recover from.



When was the best period in English-spelling's history?


Just before English spelling started. If it wasn't for plagues and the scarcity of underarm deodorants, most bad spellers could have lived quite happily then.



Why write a book about English spelling now?














It is especially important for people to know that English spelling is in dire need of a simplification overhaul, now more than ever, because we are in transition from an industrialized society to an information society. In order for people to participate in this new society, they need to be literate. A simplified spelling system would allow another 10% of our society to become literate enough to read newspapers, magazines, and web pages. In this information age, we need a simpler way to give people the information they need to compete and survive! It's only an information age for the people who can read; the others are still back in the dark ages — the mis-information age.



In this new age, everyone, including children, has to learn faster. Eliminating the need to spend increasing amounts of time on a needlessly complex spelling system would free up much-needed time to spend on more important subjects. One of the reasons our children are having so much trouble with the three R's at school is they are spending too much time on the one S.



In this so-called paperless society (which is generating more paper than ever) a simplified spelling system will save 5 to 10% of the amount of paper that is used because of the reduction in the amount of letters in words. Shorter words, thinner books, brighter minds — what more could we ask for.



Why is spelling emphasized so much at school?


Got me! I suppose you have to learn it because there's a social stigma attached to being a poor speller. Additionally, there's a perception that the better you are at spelling the smarter you are, so it appears to be an important subject to focus on. Some would say, however, that the only thing being a good speller makes you better at is spelling. It doesn't make you a better writer, a better poet, a more creative person with words. It doesn't make you understand the essence of our language better. Shakespeare would have been the exact same creative genius he was whether he was a good or bad speller. He was just lucky enough to have lived in a day when he was judged by the meaning of his words, rather than the placement of the letters within those words. In Shakespeare's day, most people's spelling was erratic; therefore, when he spelled words many different ways no one even noticed. If Shakespeare was in my class at school, however, once the teacher had deducted points for spelling errors he'd have been labeled a dunce at poetry and prose alike. The teacher would have had to borrow points from his next subject for him to come out even in English class.



Who are some of the famous people who have been in favor of simplifying English spelling?






President Theodore Roosevelt. During his presidency, he ordered the government printers to use 300 simplified spellings on all government documents. Not surprisingly, a vigorous political debate ensued. In the end, the president was forced to back down when the House of Representatives banned the new spellings from federal documents. That government fiasco should be called, "Last-Chance-Gate", because we'll never again have as good a chance as that to simplify English spelling.



Charles Darwin: Darwin was a man that could recognize a mutation when he saw one, so it's not surprising he was open to the notion of spelling reform. Darwin was no doubt convinced that our spelling system was a product of un-natural selection. Spelling Dearest provides the evidence to back up this theory.



Brigham Young: This Mormon leader had 57 children. Obviously, he was looking for streamlined ways to teach them so they could go out and earn their keep as quickly as possible. Simplified spelling must have appealed to him for that reason.



Wasn't Sir Winston Churchill against spelling reform?


Yes he was. He opposed a spelling reform bill in British parliament in 1949. He felt that changing the appearance of words would "mess up the language of Shakespeare". If the learned gentleman for the opposition had done a bit of historical research, though, he would have found that at the time of Shakespeare, English spelling had many different spellings for the same words. Shakespeare himself varied his spelling with his usual creative flair. If Mr. Churchill had understood the detrimental effect that needlessly complex spelling has on literacy, he would have realized that un-reformed spelling ruins the language of Shakespeare because it prevents an extra 10% of the population from being literate enough to read it!



If English spelling is so terrible why do so many people appear to be against simplifying it?


Complacency? Acceptance of the status quo? Better the hell on earth you know than the Garden of Eden lurking scarily around the corner? Who knows? They might even be suffering from Stockholm Syndrome; they've been abused by English spelling for so long that they have come to empathize with their abuser!



What do you say to people who say English spelling is easy to learn?


If it's so easy to learn, why do so many people have trouble learning it? If it's so easy to learn, why do even the best of us use spell-checkers? If it's so easy to learn, why are spell-checkers wrong so often? According to one estimate, over 50% of the adult population have trouble spelling. That in itself proves it's not easy to learn.



Who are some famous bad spellers?


President Kennedy: Jacky O said JFK was a bad speller. She was an editor, though, so everyone's spelling probably looked bad to her. Also, when you have world affairs and nuclear war to worry about, as JFK did, the artificial importance of needlessly complex spelling takes its rightful place at the bottom of your priority list.



Vice President Dan Quayle: Vice President Quayle, AKA, Mr. Potato-head, is definitely the poster-child for the spelling impaired. Telling a schoolchild to spell potato with an e at the end was one of the foremost spelling gaffes of all time. Millions of bad spellers throughout the English-speaking world learned how not to spell potato after that. Dan, on the other hand, is still trying to figure out what all the kafuffle was about.



What would you say if I told you I found a spelling error in your book?


I'd say, that will give the critics something to talk about. I'd also say, I'm not surprised. Having a spelling error in this book only proves how deceptive English spelling is. The book has been reviewed by professors and professional editors. If there's a spelling error after that, good on the squirrelly little chameleon for sneaking through.



I read somewhere you took 10 years to research and write the book, why so long?


One year to write and 9 years to correct the spelling. Kidding! It's a big subject — 1,400 years of history. I worked four years full time in University libraries, then six years of nights, weekends, and vacations. I doubt there's one fact or opinion about this subject that I haven't found experts polarized on both sides of the issue. I would often find five different well-respected authors saying five different well-respected things; therefore, I had to read everything available on the subject, all the way back to the surviving manuscripts of the times in question, in order to determine who was right. Often, as with many topics on any subject, the issues were seldom black or white; they were shades of black and blue fighting it out somewhere in the middle. For straight facts, of course, there is a right or wrong answer, but even then, to come to that determination was time-consuming.

Do you have a life, outside the history of English spelling?


I do now that the research and writing is over. I must admit, though, when I finally did raise my head from my desk, I was surprised to find my kids had grown and I had a grandchild — I wondered who'd been scribbling on my manuscript!