Re-launching this column after some months’ silence, I thought at first I should begin with an account of where I’m at—a tale of severe disability and financial hardship. But then I thought, no, not appropriate. Basotho have enough problems pelting down on their heads. On the subject of how I feel I’ll just quote “Full Moon”, by the prize-winning Nigerian poet Romeo Oriogun: “I have learnt to obey the past. I keep nothing. I own nothing . . . When I leave, I was never here.” Oh, and to add that my reason for re-starting the column is entirely selfish: …
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“I’ll begin with something light-hearted. Namely, favourite words.
One of the finest achievements of BBC television—some umpteen years ago—was Dennis Potter’s difficult, controversial drama series The Singing Detective. At a point the detective is ill and being treated in hospital and asks a bedside visitor “What’s the loveliest word in the English language?” He answers his own question with the word “elbow” and explains it’s not only the word’s mellifluous sound but its visual appearance in small-case letters—the way the verticals and curves relate to each other.
At secondary school my inspirational English teacher John Bristow gave a lesson on denotation. For example, the word “table” denotes a piece of furniture on which, typically, food is served. An alternative term for denotation is signification and there is a whole number of philosophical texts that explore this. As an aside, readers who remember their Shakespeare will recall the use of the word “signifying” in Macbeth’s terrifying, nihilistic “tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow” speech.
There are some words that imitate the sound they denote and these words are called onomatopoeic. Examples would be “buzz”, “clatter” and “whisper.” Apart from these, the sound of a word has nothing to do with the thing it denotes. And so a repulsive or horrifying thing can be denoted by a word that sounds quite lovely. Mr Bristow gave the example of “diarrhoea.” The thing denoted is horrible; the word is very pretty. One could imagine in a children’s tale a character called the Good Fairy Diarrhoea.
One of my favourite English words—for the sound and the look of it—is “shampoo.” Another is “cotyledon”, though I can’t for the life of me remember what this denotes or signifies (must get on to Google). And I have at least one favourite in French. There’s a kind of riverine insect called in English a dragon-fly, with a long body and long slender wings. It’s beautiful and harmless (unlike a mosquito—and there’s another example of a nice word for a horrible thing). The French word for dragon-fly is “libellule”— and that’s even better than “elbow.”
So here’s a game readers can play. Gather a few friends or family around and ask them — on the basis of the above – to list their three favourite words in Sesotho (or in isiXhosa or Amharic or whatever). It will be interesting to see if any of them come up with the same choice(s).
Next week, deadly serious — a discussion of the Gaza crisis.
Chris Dunton
