This sort of item may or may not already exist, but here it is again anyway.
With the Mastermind version of the word guess now working on a nine-letter
word, it occurred to me fairly early on that it would be fun to try to make
the words make sense as a sentence, but that didn't really happen. Anyway,
it did get me thinking about how long one could make a sensible sentence where
each word is one letter longer than the previous one. My quick-dash farting
around entry is 11 words:
 
I do see that often solemn algebra teachers establish sentiments repressedly.
 
Anyone else interested in having a go, either making a more useful sentence,
or a longer one?
 
This also got me thinking about word games in general. For instance, I once
wrote a poem where the first letters of the words were the letters of the
first words. It started:
 
Icarus cried and rose up...
 
(Notice that the first letters are ICARU... The finished product wound up
going on 20 words, I believe.)
 
So this is a spot for that sort of word play, if anyone feels like posting.
=}

63 responses total.

Can this please be linked to the language conference?

Psalm 119 is a famous acrostic  (sp?):  Each verse starts with the
successive letter of the (Hebrew) alphabet, except the last, which starts
with Pe.  However, the initials of the first, middle and last verse spell
aleph, the first letter of the alphabet.

puzzle 160, Wordplay, as been linked to language 113.

Um, there are several psalms where each verse starts with the next letter,
but 119 is not one of them.  It's in sections of 8 verses each, and each verse
in a section starts with the same letter, with the sections corresponding to
the letters of the alphabet.  (As far as what Joe said about the final verse,
I don't recall off hand; my Hebrew was scanty enough & long enough ago that
I wouldn't know without going & looking it up.  But I kind of suspect that
he's thinking of one of the other psalms.)

Is there any information on why such wordplay was used in the Bible?  That
is, was it meant to have some mystical significance, or just game-playing by
the authors?

You're right, Dave.  I wonder which one it was that Dr. Freedman was talking
about?  I'll have to track it down.

I don't remember, Rane.  I think it was at least a little of both.

On the acrostic psalms, my own guess would be that it was just seen as a
poetic device, lending structure & beauty, appropriate to the purpose of the
psalms.  Remember that some structural devices common in modern English (&
other modern European) poetry were absent - rhyme, and the kind of regular
meters we take for granted, for example.  (The most obvious structural
element, used to the point that some would say it's *the* criterion to use
in distinguishing poetry from prose in Biblical Hebrew (IIRC), is the use of
parallelism - phrases of (generally) similar lengths, in pairs (or
occasionally triplets) expressing the same ideas in different terms, or
expressing contrasting ideas, or a bunch of other (but similar) relationships.
Again, it seems likely to me that this was considered elegant & suited to
the subject.

But it's also found in what is (apparently) prose relating
to other nearby cultures, for example in Daniel & especially in bits of
dialogue in Esther.  A sample from Esther:
    ... As they were drinking wine, the king again asked Esther,
    "Now what is your petition?  It will be given you.
    And what is your request?  Even up to half the kingdom, it will
      be granted."
In Daniel, the effect is of repeated synonyms for terms - the same lists,
or very similar ones, being used over and over:
    He then summoned the satraps, prefects, governors, advisors,
    treasurers, judges, magistrates and all the other provincial
    officials to come to the dedication of the image he had set up.
    So the satraps, prefects, governors, advisors, treasurers, judges,
    magistrates and all the other provincial officials assembled for the
    dedication of the image he had set up.
or (just after that):
    Then the hearald loudly proclaimed, "This is what you are commanded to
    do, O peoples, nations, and men of every language.  As soon as you
    hear the sound of the horn, flute, zither, lyre, harp, pipes and all
    kinds of music, you must fall down and worship the image of gold ..."
My guess is that these kinds of repetition were more popular in the related
cultures (or the somewhat later times) described in those books.  (The
repetition I quoted from Esther is rather similar to the types found in
psalms, proverbs, and prophecy elsewhere; the distinction is that it seems
to be elegant speech, in the midst of prose, rather than poetry.)

(The above are from the NIV, but the points I made should, I think, apply
to any even moderately careful translation.  Obviously, applying modern
English names to ancient governmental officials & ancient musical instruments
is a tricky business involving some guesswork.)

In both prose & poetry (especially prophetic poetry) there is some use of
word play in the form of puns or other double meanings.  One example would
be in the explanations given to people's names, notably in Genesis but
also elsewhere.  (Consider, for example, (in Ruth) Naomi's telling others
not to call her Naomi [form of the word for "pleasant"] any longer, but
rather Mara [form of word for "bitter"].)  I'm not sure how much that is
what you'd call "mystical significance", Rane, but it was certainly seen
as *significant*.  But also, especially in context of scornful condemnation,
something more like what we'd call a pun is evident.  The one that comes
to mind off hand is not necessarily the best, but it does come to mind &
so I'll use it.  "He [Hezekiah] broke into pieces the bronze snake Moses
had made, for up to that time the Israelites had been burning incense to
it.  (It was called Nehushtan.)" (2 Kings 18:4)  And rather than go look
things up & figure it out, I'm going to be lazy & just quote the translators'
footnote: "_Nehushtan_ sounds like the Hebrew for _bronze_ and _snake_
and _unclean_thing_."   That should give the flavor, & I guess I'm too tired
to come up with a better example, or even to look up the words in question.

Sorry to run on so long.

I observed a long time ago that one could sound "biblical" by saying
everything twice with some elaboration: "I say onto you, I had tomato
juice for breakfast this morning: Yea, it was tomato juice which I
had this morning."

If you left out the I say unto you and Yea it would not sound very biblical,
it would just sound like you were talking to someone with a hearing problem.

I wanted to give an example rather than explain *all* the rules. Beside
repetition, the phrasing has to be changed. You can get away without the
Old English. Let's try again: We had juice for breakfast yesterday; yes,
it was yesterday that we had juice. I don't know the name for this
writing device (it must be fancier than "repetition", since it also
requires a change of syntax.)

Somehow the context does not sound biblical.  

Does to me....  8^}

I know what you are saying, Rane.  I don't know the name for that particular
figure, though.  I would guess that _someone_ has named it, if only to make
it easier to talk about in scholarly papers. :)

Tomatoes were introduced from the New World after 1492.  Perhaps a generic
'fruit of the vine' would sound more biblical.  My mother used to allow us
to drink tomato juice instead of wine or grape juice on holidays, because it
was a fruit of the vine.

Sindi, we are talking about _form_ not vocabulary.  Ever hear that "green
ideas sleep furiously"?

"We had juice for breakfast yesterday: yes, it was yesterday that we had
juice." doesn't sound biblical to me, it sounds like an old coot.

You may have just identified why the bible sounds like it does.

Heh.

I've long thought the repetition was a result of oral tradition; repetition
makes it easier to remember, and keeps the flow going while trying to remember
what comes next.

Here's a curious little homphone pair I found. Two three-syllable words are
homophones; one starts with "m" and the other with "p" when spelled, but they
start with a sound other than "m" and "p" when said aloud.

Any guesses? (The pair I found, one is fairly common and one is a rare form
of a common word.)

Mnemonic and pneumonic?
(Just off the top of my head, from your clues - starting with "p" but not with
"p" sound suggested "pn", & from there it just came to me.)

heh. =} yeah, that's it. not that's it's terribly difficult, "pn" and "ps"
are the only combos that appear word-initial that don't sound like p, that
come to mind, and "ms" doesn't work.

ph doesn't sound like p, but mh didn't work either.

pf- is sometimes /f/, too.
pt- is /t/ in pterodactyl

Is that all of them? mf- and mt- don't happen, either.

Actually, I'd have to protest that they aren't really homophones.  When I say
them, anyway, the first vowel in "mnemonic" is a short "e", but the first
vowel in "pneumonic" is one of the long-"u" set.

I'll admit that I think I've heard "mneumonic", but I also know someone who
regularly uses this word in talking to me (I'm giving tech support to him,
you understand) and who says "nemonic".  The word's uncommon enough & unusual
enough in form to confuse people.  And then remember that Rane insists that
"dog", "log", "fog", & "frog" don't rhyme ... you never know what people will
do to a word.

For most speakers of English, all unstressed vowels are pronounced as schwa.
The first syllable in this case is unstressed, so *in casual speech* the two
words are homophones for most speakers of English.
 
The problem with stating that two words are homophones is, as you point out,
they may not be homophones for all speakers, or under all contexts. "Aural"
and "oral" *can* be distinguished in careful speech, and "writer" and "rider"
have an incredibly subtle difference that doesn't normally show up in casual
speech, but pops up in careful speech. "Which" and "witch" aren't homophones
for those increasingly rare speakers who still say /hwIc/ for "which" and
/wIc/ for "witch," while "pin" and "pen" are homophones in parts of the South,
but say them the same in the North and you'll likely get an odd glance.
 
Rane, what are your grounds for saying those four words don't rhyme? That's
a new one to me.

They don't rhyme for me either.  Isn't there a discussion of this in another
item?  I say /dog/, /lAg/, /fAg/, /frAg/.  

It is just dog that doesn't rhyme with log, fog, bog, etc (in my dialect
and that of many others). In fact, for me, nothing rhymes with dog,
except some prefixes, like aug- . I  write the distinction as being
dog is pronounced like dawg, while log is prnounced like lahg. 

#27, 28> Ok, that makes sense. Suggesting there are four different vowels
doesn't make sense, but I've heard /dawg/ too. Incidentally, "white," "wide,"
and "wine" all have different phonetic vowels, which is why "whiter" and
"wider" sound different in formal speech, but nearly the same in casual speech
(/t/ > [D] and /d/ > [D] between vowels).

I pronounce the i in wide longer than in white but probably the same as in
wine.

No, you don't. Not if you speak English. ;}
 
Go find a French speaker and get them to explain it to you. You could start
by asking them the difference between "chien" and "chienne."

I do the same as  keesan - extending the i sound in wide for a longer
time than in white. White comes out more "clipped". The i in wide
might transition into a dipthong. Can't tell, and my mouth is freezing up.

Oh, I didn't mean to say that Keesan doesn't pronounce "white" and "wide"
differently, I meant to say that she also pronounces the vowel in "wine"
differently.
 
The relevant rules in English:
-- Vowels are shortened before voiceless consonants: "white" has a shorter
vowel, while the vowel in "wide," "wine," and "why" are the same length.
-- Vowels are nasalized before nasal consonants: "wine" has a nasal vowel,
while the vowel in "wide," "white," and "why" are non-nasal.

You forgot "whine".             8-{)]

I didn't mean to suggest that Rane said he pronounced them all differently,
but I couldn't remember which one(s) he said didn't rhyme with each other.

Re "pin" & "pen": but in at least some parts of the south where they're
pronounced the same, they're both "pee-yun", remember.

I wuz born in Misery, but I moved to Michigan when I was just past a year old,
so I'm shur many of the nuances wuz loss to me. Alls I know is the udder kids
used to laugh at me when I axed for a pen cuz they wanet to know how I wuz
gonna write wit a pin.
 
#34> "whine" and "wine" are homophones for most speakers of English. ;}

I  purse my lips  more saying whine than I do saying wine. Sort of the
difference bewteen where and were.

prolly an artifact of the older, more aspirated distinction (when wh- was
pronounced as /hw/, not as /w/).

I pronounced the o sound in tot shorter than that in taught.  Do some people
pronounce them as totally different vowels?  I taught the tot, the tot was
taught to totter....

- Backtalk version 1.3.30 - Copyright 1996-2006, Jan Wolter and Steve Weiss