BLAZE

Leslie's Language Round-Up

An irregular feature about language in our time


From the "There's no defence like a good defence" File...

Library mural littered with misspellings

LIVERMORE, Calif. (AP) - It didn't take a nuclear physicist to realize changes were needed after a $40,000 ceramic mural was unveiled outside the city's new library and everyone could see the misspelled names of Einstein, Shakespeare, Vincent Van Gogh, Michelangelo and seven other historical figures.

"Our library director is very frustrated that she has this lovely new library and it has all these misspellings in front," said city councilwoman Lorraine Dietrich, one of three council members who voted Monday to authorize paying another $6,000, plus expenses, to fly the artist up from Florida to fix the errors.

Reached at her Miami studio Wednesday, Maria Alquilar said she is willing to fix the brightly coloured five-metre-wide circular work but offered no apologies for the 11 misspellings among the 175 names.

"The importance of this work is that it is supposed to unite people," Alquilar said.

"They are denigrating my work and the purpose of this work."

Alquilar said creating and installing the work took a lot of time and money and the mural sat at her Santa Cruz, Calif., studio for two years until the city cleared the way for its installation.

There were plenty of people around during the installation who could and should have seen the missing and misplaced letters, she said.

"Even though I was on my hands and knees laying the installation out, I didn't see it," she said.

The mistakes wouldn't even register with a true artisan, Alquilar said.

"The people that are into humanities and are into Blake's concept of enlightenment, they are not looking at the words," she said.

"In their mind, the words register correctly."


Editorial Comment: The ability to form words is not writing
Too few people have the ability or time to work out exactly what they want to say and then say it. They fall back on boilerplate text, shop-worn clichés, or inarticulate paraphrases of their real meaning. That isn't a matter of correct grammar, good punctuation or impressive vocabulary, and curing it will need more than style guides or diatribes. — Michael Quinion


Entertainment: Pink Words
Excerpted from Pink's fabulous single "God Is a DJ"

(Verse 1)
I've been the girl with her skirt pulled high
Been the outcast never running with mascara eyes
Now I see the world as a candy store
With a cigarette smile, saying things you can't ignore
Like mommy I love you
Daddy I hate you
Brother I need you
Lover hey fuck you
I can see everything here with my third eye
Like the blue in the sky

(Verse 2)
I've been the girl, middle finger in the air
Unaffected by rumors, the truth: I don't care
So open your mouth and stick out your tongue
You might as well let go, you can't take back what you've done
So find a new lifestyle
A reason to smile
Look for Nirvana
Under the strobe lights
Sequins and sex dreams
You whisper to me
There's no reason to cry


Births and Deaths
Noted poet and fascist T. S. (Thomas Stearns) Eliot was born on September 26, 1888 in St. Louis, Missouri. In his 1935 essay "Religion and Literature" he reflects, "It is not enough to understand what we ought to be, unless we know what we are; and we do not understand what we are, unless we know what we ought to be" — demonstrating in this observation both chiasmus and paradox. How rhetorical!
(with information from chiasmus.com)


and finally...

Fashion News from the Personification Department
Excerpted from Sarah Slean's much-anticipated single "Lucky Me"

(Verse 1)
Science wears a new suit
To his coffee toast and eggs
But he has to skip the stairs now
Because of two broken legs
Whine whine I cannot climb
Everytime's the same
I'd be more inclined to help him
If he could remember my name

(Verse 2)
Faith can't fill the dance hall
'Cause her powers have declined
But at the beauty pageant
She will always take the prize
Light light Easter white
Roll her in the dirt
When it comes time for kneeling
She'll say "You go first"


Pictures at 11! : P