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Mark Twain on Speling Reform and Simplified Spelling (A promotion of phonographic writing) (to be riten in RES: Restored English Spelling) http://www.unifon.org/twain-simpspl.html Cadmus Tries to Reform of Hieroglyphics http://www.twainquotes.com/ |
| This
article, written during the autumn of 1899, was about the last writing
done by Samuel Clemens on any impersonal subject. This essay is similar
in to one written by G.B.Shaw. One difference
is that Shaw always wrote in Pitman shorthand and was dissatisfied with
it. He didn't like abbreaviations and he believed the alphabet should
be linear - most shorthands are not. Twain seems to say that he never mastered
a shorthand but he could see its utility. There is a reference to
Burnz' shorthand which is a variant of Pitman shorthand.
Twain and Shaw were both dissatisfied with the efforts of the simplified spellers. Those who used it were in danger of being viewed as illiterate, uneducated, or nuts. Twain observed: A written character with which we are not familiar does not offend. Mind, I myself am a Simplified Speller; I belong to that unhappy guild that is patiently and hopefully trying to reform our drunken old alphabet by reducing his whiskey. Well, it will improve him. When they get through and have reformed him all they can by their system he will be only HALF drunk. Above that condition their system can never lift him. There is no competent, and lasting, and real reform for him but to take away his whiskey entirely, and fill up his jug with Pitman's wholesome and undiseased alphabet. [see Pitman's Fonotypy ] One great drawback to Simplified Spelling is, that in print a simplified word looks so like the very nation! and when you bunch a whole squadron of the Simplified together the spectacle is very nearly unendurable. Twain did not have a specific proposal but was partial to some kind of phonographic alphabet - perhaps something along the lines of Pitman's shorthand. |
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comments to:
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PMF-Shavian Notation Pitman
Shorthand |
I have had a kindly feeling, a friendly feeling, a cousinly feeling toward Simplified Spelling, from the beginning of the movement three years ago [1896], but nothing more inflamed than that. It seemed to me to merely propose to substitute one inadequacy for another; a sort of patching and plugging poor old dental relics with cement and gold and porcelain paste; what was really needed was a new set of teeth. That is to say, a new ALPHABET. [ See G.B. Shaw on same subject ] [Twain]
The heart of our trouble is with our foolish alphabet. It doesn't know how to spell, and can't be taught. In this it is like all other alphabets except one--the phonographic. This is the only competent alphabet in the world. It can spell and correctly pronounce any word in our language.
That admirable alphabet, that brilliant alphabet, that inspired alphabet, can be learned in an hour or two. In a week the student can learn to write it with some little facility, and to read it with considerable ease. I know, for I saw it tried in a public school in Nevada forty-five years ago, and was so impressed by the incident that it has remained in my memory ever since.
I wish we could adopt it in place of our present written (and printed) character. I mean SIMPLY the alphabet; simply the consonants and the vowels -- I don't mean any REDUCTIONS or abbreviations of them, such as the shorthand writer uses in order to get compression and speed. No, I would SPELL EVERY WORD OUT.
I will insert the alphabet here as I find it in Burnz's PHONIC SHORTHAND. [Figure 1] It is arranged on the basis of Isaac Pitman's PHONOGRAPHY. Isaac Pitman was the originator and father of scientific phonography. It is used throughout the globe. It was a memorable invention. He made it public seventy- three years ago. The firm of Isaac Pitman & Sons, New York, still exists, and they continue the master's work.
What should we gain?
First of all, we could spell DEFINITELY--and correctly--any word you please, just by the SOUND of it. We can't do that with our present alphabet. For instance, take a simple, every-day word PHTHISIS. If we tried to spell it by the sound of it, we should make it TYSIS, and be laughed at by every educated person.
Secondly, we should gain in REDUCTION OF LABOR in writing.
Simplified Spelling makes valuable reductions in the case of several hundred words, but the new spelling must be LEARNED. You can't spell them by the sound; you must get them out of the book.
But even if we knew the simplified form for every word in the language, the phonographic alphabet would still beat the Simplified Speller "hands down" in the important matter of economy of labor. I will illustrate:
PRESENT FORM: through, laugh, highland.
SIMPLIFIED FORM: thru, laff, hyland.
PHONOGRAPHIC FORM: thru laf hyland [RITE]
thhroo laf hieland [Truespel]
thhru laff hailand [Spanglish]
thru laf hyland [RES]
TrU lxf hIlcnd [Unifon]
TrM lyf hFland [Shavian]
TrM laf hFlandshavian requires a free shaw font to display
download hereFigure 2 To write the word "through," the pen has to make twenty-one strokes. [7 letrz, 21 stro'ks]
To write the word "thru," then pen has to make twelve strokes-- a good saving. [4 letrz, 12 stro'ks]
To write that same word with the phonographic alphabet, the pen has to make only THREE strokes.
To write the word "laugh," the pen has to make FOURTEEN strokes.
To write "laff," the pen has to make the SAME NUMBER of strokes--no labor is saved to the penman.
To write the same word with the phonographic alphabet, the pen has to make only THREE strokes.
To write the word "highland," the pen has to make twenty-two strokes.
To write "hyland," the pen has to make eighteen strokes.
To write that word with the phonographic alphabet, the pen has to make only FIVE strokes. [Figure 3]
To write the words "phonographic alphabet," the pen has to make fifty-three strokes.
To write "fonografic alfabet," the pen has to make fifty strokes. To the penman, the saving in labor is insignificant.
To write that word (with vowels) with the phonographic alphabet, the pen has to make only SEVENTEEN strokes.
PHONOGRAPHIC ALPHABET 20 letrz fonografic alfabet [RITE] 18 letrz 50 strokes
foenugrrafik alfubet [Truespel] 20 letrz 58 strokes
foanagraffic alfabet [Spanglish] 20 letrz 58 strokes
foanografic alfabet [RES] 18 letrz 50 strokes
fOncgrafik alfcbet [Unifon] 17 letrz
fOncgrafik alfcbet [Unifont] 17 letrz
fOnagrAfik Alfabet [Shavian] 17 letrz
fOnagryfik Alfabet 17 strokes17 strokes
shavian & unifon require a free font to displayonly 17 strokes with a monoline phonetic shorthand
Figure 4Without the vowels, only THIRTEEN strokes. The vowels are hardly necessary, this time.
We make five pen-strokes in writing an m. Thus: [Figure 5] a stroke down; a stroke up; a second stroke down; a second stroke up; a final stroke down. Total, five. The phonographic alphabet accomplishes the m with a single stroke--a curve, like a parenthesis that has come home drunk and has fallen face down right at the front door where everybody that goes along will see him and say, Alas!
When our written m is not the end of a word, but is otherwise located, it has to be connected with the next letter, and that requires another pen-stroke, making six in all, before you get rid of that m. But never mind about the connecting strokes--let them go. Without counting them, the twenty-six letters of our alphabet consumed about eighty pen-strokes for their construction--about three pen-strokes per letter.
It is THREE TIMES THE NUMBER required by the phonographic alphabet. It requires but ONE stroke for each letter.
My writing-gait is--well, I don't know what it is, but I will time myself and see. Result: it is twenty-four words per minute. I don't mean composing; I mean COPYING. There isn't any definite composing-gait.
Very well, my copying-gait is 1,440 words per hour--say 1,500. If I could use the phonographic character with facility I could do the 1,500 in twenty minutes. I could do nine hours' copying in three hours; I could do three years' copying in one year. Also, if I had a typewriting machine with the phonographic alphabet on it--oh, the miracles I could do!
I am not pretending to write that character well. I have never had a lesson, and I am copying the letters from the book. But I can accomplish my desire, at any rate, which is, to make the reader get a good and clear idea of the advantage it would be to us if we could discard our present alphabet and put this better one in its place--using it in books, newspapers, with the
typewriter, and with the pen.
MAN DOG HORSE: maen dog hors [Spanglish]
m@n dog hors [Unigraf]
mAn dog hDs [Shavian]
mAn dog hDs
shavian requires a free shaw font to displayFigure 6 [Figure 6] -- MAN DOG HORSE. I think it is graceful and would look comely in print. And consider--once more, I beg--what a labor-saver it is! Ten pen-strokes with the one system to convey those three words above, and thirty-three by the other! [Figure 6] I mean, in SOME ways, not in all. I suppose I might go so far as to say in most ways, and be within the facts, but never mind; let it go at SOME. One of the ways in which it exercises this birthright is--as I think--continuing to use our laughable alphabet these seventy-three years while there was a rational one at hand, to be had for the taking.
It has taken five hundred years to simplify some of Chaucer's rotten spelling--if I may be allowed to use to frank a term as that--and it will take five hundred years more to get our exasperating new Simplified Corruptions accepted and running smoothly. And we sha'n't be any better off then than we are now; for in that day we shall still have the privilege the Simplifiers are exercising now: ANYBODY can change the spelling that wants to.
BUT YOU CAN'T CHANGE THE PHONOGRAPHIC SPELLING; THERE ISN'T ANY WAY. It will always follow the SOUND. If you want to change the spelling, you have to change the sound first.
Mind, I myself am a Simplified Speller; I belong to that unhappy guild that is patiently and hopefully trying to reform our drunken old alphabet by reducing his whiskey. Well, it will improve him. When they get through and have reformed him all they can by their system he will be only HALF drunk. Above that condition their system can never lift him. There is no competent, and lasting, and real reform for him but to take away his whiskey entirely, and fill up his jug with Pitman's wholesome and undiseased alphabet.
One great drawback to Simplified Spelling is, that in print a simplified word looks so like the very nation! and when you bunch a whole squadron of the Simplified together the spectacle is very nearly unendurable.
"The da ma ov koars kum when the publik ma be expektd to get rekonsyled to the bezair asspekt of the Simplified Kombynashuns, [see note]
but--if I may be allowed the expression-- is it worth the wasted time?"[SB] In 1899 Ellis' forerunner of New Spelling would have been available but the orthography above is not new spelling. It may be more phonemic than the traditional orthography but from this snippet, it doesn't appear to be very systematic. The following are examples of systematic orthography Tha dey mey ov cors com wen the pubblic mey bi expected tu get reckonsaild tu the bizaar asspect av the Simmplifaid Commbineishnz. Thu dae mae uv kors kum wen thu publik mae bee iksppektid tue get rekaanssield tue thu buzzaar aspekt uv thu Simplified Kaambinnaeshinz. [Truespel] systematic and phonemic The day may ov koars kum when the publik may be expectd tu get reconsyld tu the bizaar aspect ov the Simplified Combinaytions. [RES positional spelling] x dei mei a'v kors kum wen x pu'blik mei bi ekspekta'd tu get rekonsyld tu x bizar aspekt ov x simplifyd combinei5nz. Chkt Spel Da dA mA cv kOrs kum wen Dc publik mA bE ekspektcd tU get rekcnsIld tu Da bczor aspekt cv Da simplifId kombinAShanz. 
Da dA mA cv kOrs kum wen Dc publik mA bE ekspektcd tU get rekcnsIld tu Da bczor aspekt cv Da simplifId kombinAShanz.
Figure 7 To see our letters put together in ways to which we are not accustomed offends the eye, and also takes the EXPRESSION out of the words.
La on, Makduf, and damd be he hoo furst krys hold, enuf!
It doesn't thrill you as it used to do. The simplifications have sucked the thrill all out of it.
But a written character with which we are NOT ACQUAINTED does not offend us--Greek, Hebrew, Russian, Arabic, and the others--they have an interesting look, and we see beauty in them, too. And this is true of hieroglyphics, as well. There is something pleasant and engaging about the mathematical signs when we do not understand them. The mystery hidden in these things has a fascination for us: we can't come across a printed page of shorthand without being impressed by it and wishing we could read it.
Very well, what I am offering for acceptance and adopting is not shorthand, but longhand, written with the SHORTHAND ALPHABET UNREACHED. You can write three times as many words in a minute with it as you can write with our alphabet. And so, in a way, it IS properly a shorthand. It has a pleasant look, too; a beguiling look, an inviting look. I will write something
in it, in my rude and untaught way:
[Figure 8] Pitman Shorthand example
Ley on, Macduff, and dammd bi hi hu ferst kraiz hoald, enuff!
Even when _I_ do it it comes out prettier than it does in Simplified Spelling. Yes, and in the Simplified it costs one hundred and twenty-three pen-strokes to write it, whereas in the phonographic it costs only twenty-nine.
[Figure 9] is probably [Figure 10] Let us hope so, anyway.
Comments top
Doug wrote:
MY REACTION: An attractiv HTML layout but sadly far out from enny current SSS groop's consensus on gradual reform.
A WELTER OF SIMPLIFYING AULTERNATIVS, MOAST LOOKING AT FERST GLANCE TU BE AULMOAST CONSCIUSLY ARRAINGED TU SHOW GROTESK DISTORTIONS THAT COMPLICATE MOR THAN THAY SIMPLIFY; TIPICAL OF THE DELIBERAT PARODIES OF REFORM COMMON IN MANESTREEM MEEDIA RIDICULING REFORM SUGGESTIONS. FEW OF
THEES CODES ENCURAGE LITERAT ENGLISH UZERS TU EXPECT REFORMS THAT RIME WITH COMMON TRADITIONAL GRAFEEMS. IT ISNT OFENDING THE EYE THAT TURNS ME OFF SO MUCH AZ OFENDING LOGIC:DA MA for DAY MAY, BEZAIR for what I rime with T.S. BIZ + ARE, ASSPEKT using SS in a consonant cluster tipe non-existent in T.O., etc.
Spanglish may be helpful for thoze seeking bilingual literacy in Spanish (or sum uther language) and English, but for thoze unfamilyar with Spanish
etc. grafeems it can oanly delay familiarity with T.O. -- Doug Everingham*This is not Spanglish but a pre-NewSpelling notation endorsed by the simplified spellers. This is not to say that some Spanglish words are not equally bizaare. The saving grace is that Spanglish is pronunciation guide spelling, not a reform proposal. The Saxon reform is simply to reinstate the updated Saxon alphabet [removing those sounds that are no longer part of the language] and respelling 10% of the traditional words that cannot be pronounced as they are currently spelled. e.g. ruff for rough.
After such a reform there would still be problems with some diphthongs. allow could be alou or alo or alau. Digraphs would still have up to three different pronunciations but all the pronunciations would be close and interpretable. break would bethe same as breck. beak would be beck which might be close enough. Respelling this word as it sounds would be biek or beek.
The Shaw Alphabet is another example of a non-Roman script that would meet most of Twain's criteria for something better than Simplified Spelling (phonemic spelling). Shavian tries the obscure the relationship to the roman character shapes. Shaw's will specifically requested a non-roman script for the same reasons explained here by Twain. If you can't see a relationship, then you can be offended. The problem is that a notation is supposed to communicate and using the Shaw alphabet is like using a secret code. PMF, is close enough to the Roman shapes that it can almost be read without a key. It is certainly much easier to learn and recall than Shavian because (1) the shapes are historical and (2) the shapes are pictographic [< = corner] or mnemonically linked to other shapes [ei = e shape + i shape]. Like Shavian, similar shapes are used to reference similar sounds. The shape for the voiced and unvoiced phoneme are usually just 180 degrees apart. < is the shape for c/k, > is the shape for g. Check out p-b, t-d, k-g, f-v, s-z, ch-j.
source page: http://victorian.fortunecity.com/vangogh/555/Spell/twain-simpspl.html
shavian page: http://victorian.fortunecity.com/vangogh/555/Spell/shaw-keyboard.html
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