An amusement
 

A friend sent me the following, apparently from a 1948 Edinburgh student magazine (apologies to anyone who's heard it before):

Mary bought a pair of skates
Upon the ice to frisk
But all her friends thought she was mad
Her little *

I lke it. Mind you it took me a moment to work it out.

That makes me sad, suddenly all too aware that I live in not only the unhappiest part of the UK (recent survey) but also the least literate. Here everyone calls it an "asterix" and writes "ect." because "it's short for eck-settera, ennit".

And what makes me sad is that I keep noticing and cannot speak. A sad old Besserwisser, I go muttering about my business, my mouth full of bitten tongue.

Once you've bitten your tongue even once, even if you don't do it again for decades, your tongue is forever a bitten one.

I'm pretty sure I thought it was "asterick" when I was a kid, but someone straightened me out fairly early and I've gotten it right ever since. It's sadder, I think, that even educated people today seem to have given up the word "me" in favor of "I" whenever another person is involved. "He gave it to Sally and I" kind of thing. I can live with astericks, but not that.

Mary bought a pair of skates
Upon the ice to frisk
But all her friends thought she was mad
Her little *

That's amusing and clever, Brian. Like John, I have to admit to a very slight 'satellite delay' - a tech-y term I've just learnt.

Roger,
even educated people today seem to have given up the word "me" in favor of "I"
Don't even start me on this one! It's nearly always "myself" now, not even "I" or "me":

"If you have any problems please feel free to contact myself at this number..."
"Myself and my husband had a lovely meal last night." Aaaarrrgghhhh!!!!!

Jayne

Naw, Jayne, the Welsh aren't unhappy. They're miserable gits, and they ENJOY their misery.

Jayne, like you and John, it took me a moment for the penny to drop. The laughter when it did so was what caused me to post it here.

"I", "me" ... like all degradations of the language, it's probably a losing battle. I remember, decades ago, upbraiding anyone who misused the word "hopefully". These days, I imagine that the phrases "I hope" or "With luck" or "It is to be hoped that" are given in the OED as "alternative (archaic)".

The Internet has had an enormous influence on the increase of illiteracy. I fear that the geek shall inherit the earth.

I, too, was raised to look down on those who say "hopefully" to mean "it is to be hoped" rather than "in a hopeful manner." But a wise lexicographer coaxed me down off my high horse by pointing out that English might be better off if it had a generally accepted equivalent of the perfectly literate German hoffentlich. After all, "thankfully" and "happily" don't just mean "in a thankful manner" or "in a happy manner." So hopefully we can stop having a problem here.

But there are limits to my loosey-goosey permissiveness. I still feel entitled to sneer and bristle at flout/flaunt and infer/imply screwups. Also misuse of apostrophe's.

Oh, so does myself! ;)

More of my pet hates are the mixing up of 'amount' and 'number', and 'less' and 'fewer'.

Jayne

A friend of mine who speaks excellent German also told me many years ago that English, strangely for so rich a language, lacks the equivalent of hoffentlich. But in his view, that word should be hopeably. After all, we have both regretfully and regrettably, so why should hope be denied similar treatment?

I fear the day will come when people no longer understand the phrase "it is better to travel hopefully than to arrive".

I've never understood the rule against "hopefully." As Chris and Brian note, "happily" and various other adverbs are used in the same manner without criticism, so why is "hopefully" singled out? Besides, the argument that "hopefully" is an ambiguous modifier is simply wrong. I've never heard anyone saying "Hopefully it will not rain" being understood, even for an instant, as wishing for or predicting hopeless rain.

Just don't get me started on 'beg the question'.

Roger, I have only three objections to the misuse of "hopefully":

1. It is unnecessary
2. It is ugly
3. It is illiterate

Apart from that, it's fine.

Why not, Basil? Or is that begging the question?

No, but your three objections beg the question -- especially the third.

Dear Roger,

It was very kind of you to invite us to dinner. As you know, the journey is rather a complicated one, and we don't know how long it will take us, but it would be foolish to pass up the opportunity to sample your gastronomic cuisine, especially if you manage to find the ingredients for your renowned Lobster Thermidor. We shall be arriving hopefully at about 7 pm.

Regards,
Brian

I love Word Nerd Subcommittee hearings!

I used to say I'd rather die than write "hopefully", but as I grew older I changed my mind.

As for me, Janice, I never really wanted to grow older, but didn't care for the alternative.

Hopefully, it is never better to travel hopelessly than to arrive, and of course the blessed satnav has put an end to most hopless travel... hopefully, or indeed hopeably.

Re lobsters, just to say I shall soon be enjoying the blessed crustacean along with my family, an Irish poet and his wife, a British journalist in our splendid tradition, at the Lobster Shack in Whitstable looking out over the noble Thames Estuary at the Isle of Sheppey when the King of Kent lies sleeping with his hundred knights.

Not Thermidor, however, a revolutionary concoction.

I would hate for you to arrive with low expectations regarding my Lobster Thermidor. Hopefully you will arrive hopefully. Or is it, I am full of hope that you will arrive full of hope? Happily it doesn't matter.

Geoff Nunberg on "hopefully".

Good article. Well-written. Amusing. Just plain dumb wrong.

Thanks, Pedro. Interesting.

Although I use it in informal writing as when writing in this forum to friendlies, I wouldn't use it in formal writing. No, definitely not.

But this generation too shall pass. Hopefully not soon.

The only reason to avoid it is that people like Brian and Janice object to it. For similar reasons, I try to avoid splitting my infinitives. After all, whoever is "right" about the proper usage, no one ever objects to a failure to split an infinitive, so one might as well toe the senseless line and not split the damn things. And by the same token, no one was ever smugly derided for not using "hopefully" in the manner under discussion. So it's the safe thing to do.

But I still haven't heard anyone explain why "hopefully" should be any more objectionable than "happily." The unspoken but clearly understood words "I say" precede each term, as well as many other adverbs, yet it's only "hopefully" that seems to have earned widespread condemnation.

ya boo
 

I cannot believe that (e.g.) 'boldly to go' or 'to go boldly' would be any improvement on 'to boldly go' & in any case how can you 'split' a particle phrase that consists of 2 separate words? No one would complain about 'by boldly going'. I'll take the 'short infinitive' any day. And in a hopeful frame of mind, too.

Roger, I agree that it's tricky to explain, but I think it is connected to the way in which the adjective that forms the adverb can be used. We can (but don't ask me why) say "a happy event", but we can't say "a regretful event" - it would have to be "a regrettable event". In the same way, I don't think we could say "a hopeful event", but unfortunately the word "hopeable" doen't exist, so we would have to say something like "a hoped-for event", although it's hard to see how that could be made into an adverb.

But I remain convinced that if the English Language, and the whole of English Literature, didn't feel the need to misuse this word until the last few decades, then it is simply slipshod usage rather than an indispensable modification of the language. After all, new words can always be invented as required; there is no need to blur the meaning of existing ones.

And in my acceptance of your kind invitation to dinner, I defy you to state with certainty in which sense the word "hopefully" is used.

Basil, your example of a split infinitive is unfair: there are clearly some phrases, however grammatically objectionable we may find them, that are sacrosanct!