I’m pretty sure the “to speak plainly with the people, use words of Anglo rather than Latin origin” point is itself an anachronism and affectation.
I think most decent writers have a pretty good “vibe” for which words are common vs not, already. But if you’re unsure, statistical frequency tests are a better proxy for familiarity than etymology.
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Attempted rewrite:
I reckon the rede “to speak straight with the folk, reach for words with Anglo root, rather than that of the Walnut Folk” is itself a thing out of its own time, and a put-on of the highest kind.
I think most writers worth their salt already have a pretty good ken for which words are everyday and which aren’t. But if you can’t rightly tell, a reckoning of how oft a word shows up is a better gauge for how couth it is than a word’s wellspring.
It might’ve made more sense in Orwell’s time, both because the Latin-origin <> “overly fancy” correlation was higher, and because fancy public-school educated writers of his time were expected to automatically know which words were of Latin origin, and/or had a much poorer sense of which words are statistically common.
Also he was British, and I think the class divide in etymology is stronger there than it is here, and would have been stronger at the time than it is now.
Your rewrite seemed ‘Southern’ to me, so probably there’s still some class effect (although it also seemed ‘old-timey’).
Quick search indicates that Churchill is the originator of the sentiment, which makes more sense (earlier, more general-audience, maybe useful for a politician to subtly signal some nationalism, etc).
Quick search indicates that Churchill is the originator of the sentiment
Where did you hear that? The Fowlers’ classic 1906 guide says “Prefer the Saxon word to the Romance” and the opinion was already standard at that time.
Your rewrite seemed ‘Southern’ to me, so probably there’s still some class effect (although it also seemed ‘old-timey’).
Yeah tbf I did stack the cards a little for the rewrite, leaning into phrasings like “a word’s wellspring” rather than “where the word comes from” for “etymology.” Obviously Orwell himself is too good a writer to make such elementary mistakes.
Interesting on the “Southern” effect, I wonder if language shift is faster in the North/West than the South.
Oh, cool thought! I was thinking it’s just more straightforwardly Anglo-Saxon, except for the areas with strong French influence, owing to the waves of German settlement.
was also rhyming with the ‘southern English is closer to colonial-era English than modern British English’ fun-fact that I often hear floating around.
I think the rewrite is a touch too affected. Here is my try:
There is some thinking which says “to speak well with the many and not the few, throw away the words of the high born from other lands who put on airs, and use the words of the folk of the land instead”. I think this is an old saw and past its time. A good speaker knows their words well, and can pick the ones that work for the folk they wish to speak to. And if they cannot tell, let them pick the word that is more used instead of the “older” one.
And indeed I think this is simpler than the original.
As with Arjun’s reply, this is harder than you might think (though you got closer). In particular you only messed up the etymology once, but your translation is more lossy in meaning.
throw away the words of the high born from other lands who put on airs
This has a direct class and affectation critique of using Latinate words which wasn’t in the original, or is at most implied (a “folk from other lands” might just speak their natural tongue).
A good speaker knows their words well, and can pick the ones that work for the folk they wish to speak to
“Words that work” can imply persuasion or other reasons to select specific words, whereas the original quote was just about fluency.
And if they cannot tell, let them pick the word that is more used instead of the “older” one.
I think “older” also implies different things than the anglo vs latin distinction. It also contradicts the implicit message of your quote more (since phrases like “old saw” invokes an older/more antiquated vibe).
Separately I agree my rewrite was a bit too affected. I intentionally exaggerated it for humorous effect.
I did study middle english academically, but old english was only ever a recreational interest so my anglisc is not most meet. The reason for the implied class critique is that the initial burst of latinate loans come from historic french after the norman conquest. These basically displaced and reformed old english into middle english and were imposed by the conquerors after their victory, since the conquerors spoke french. In fact, english kings wrote declarations in french until at least 1258 https://archive.org/details/onlyenglishprocl00ellirich . This created an literal class distinction between the mostly french/latin speaking court and the mostly old/middle english speaking population etc. (I am sure you know this, just justifying my choice of phrase. See also that oft repeated factoid about cow/beef, chicken/poultry etc.). It also creates a clear chronology for when latinate versus germantic influences were dominant (old english is ofc influenced by norse and the danelaw).
Since then, latin/greek has been historically used as the international language for law, religion, science and medicine, hence even more jargon coming in or being coined as latinate words. “Use” is an interesting one, however! Still, I think you could edit mine to use the word “say” instead of “use” and it would basically still work.
[EDIT: I have since been informed that there has been a re-reestablishment of non-latinate words as proper upper class speech in the UK relatively recently. Also in general the Norman conquest was a long time ago and lots of intermixing happened, take what I say with some mixing function and noise added.]
Did you use Claude for the rewrite? I think you can do a much less weird one (and what is “Walnut Folk”?) e.g.
I think that “to talk with folks plainly, use words with Anglo-Saxon rather than Latin roots” is itself put on and worn out.
I think most good writers already have a good “feel” for which words are mainstream or over-the-top. But if you can’t tell, it’s better to look at how often the word appears rather than its roots.
Walnut is from the wealhhnutu, “foreign nut.” It’s the same root as what the Germanic tribes called the Romans (and other groups, like the Celts): Wēalh. There aren’t many surviving English words of that origin, Wales/Welsh and walnut are the ones I found. Referring to Latin as Welsh would be more confusing. hence Walnut Folk, which I also thought was funny.
Also, “put on and worn out” to mean anachronism and affectation seems like a lossy translation.
That said, I do agree that my original comment could’ve been made much more simply, and thinking critically about it (including translating everything to words of Anglo root in a non-barbarous way) would’ve made it simpler. But I think the high-level thing people should be aiming towards is to speak simply and plainly, rather than aiming for non-Latinate roots.
I considered “Latin,” which obviously comes from Latin, but via Old English so I think it’s fine. (Note that “Anglo” also comes from Latin, so a better case is that I should have just said “English.”) I don’t think it’s necessary to come up with made-up words for other places or languages that have their own names for this purpose.
I agree that “plain” and “appear” come from Old French and those were oversights. And it shows that it’s hard to actually write this way without oversights.
Also I think “put on” means “affected” and “worn out” means “anachronistic + a specific narrative of why it’s anachronistic, i.e. because the advice became worn out.”
Maybe “Vlach” is a better option? Though it has the major downside of coming through slavic and sounding sorta out of place because of that. Similarly for “Gaul”.
it’s much closer to meaning “roman” than “walnut folk” is! romania = roman-ia = wallach-ia. it does also literally mean an eastern romance speaker, which is a subset of latin speakers, and it got that meaning from just meaning romance/latin speaker earlier
I’m pretty sure the “to speak plainly with the people, use words of Anglo rather than Latin origin” point is itself an anachronism and affectation.
I think most decent writers have a pretty good “vibe” for which words are common vs not, already. But if you’re unsure, statistical frequency tests are a better proxy for familiarity than etymology.
__
Attempted rewrite:
I reckon the rede “to speak straight with the folk, reach for words with Anglo root, rather than that of the Walnut Folk” is itself a thing out of its own time, and a put-on of the highest kind.
I think most writers worth their salt already have a pretty good ken for which words are everyday and which aren’t. But if you can’t rightly tell, a reckoning of how oft a word shows up is a better gauge for how couth it is than a word’s wellspring.
It might’ve made more sense in Orwell’s time, both because the Latin-origin <> “overly fancy” correlation was higher, and because fancy public-school educated writers of his time were expected to automatically know which words were of Latin origin, and/or had a much poorer sense of which words are statistically common.
Also he was British, and I think the class divide in etymology is stronger there than it is here, and would have been stronger at the time than it is now.
Your rewrite seemed ‘Southern’ to me, so probably there’s still some class effect (although it also seemed ‘old-timey’).
Quick search indicates that Churchill is the originator of the sentiment, which makes more sense (earlier, more general-audience, maybe useful for a politician to subtly signal some nationalism, etc).
Where did you hear that? The Fowlers’ classic 1906 guide says “Prefer the Saxon word to the Romance” and the opinion was already standard at that time.
Yeah tbf I did stack the cards a little for the rewrite, leaning into phrasings like “a word’s wellspring” rather than “where the word comes from” for “etymology.” Obviously Orwell himself is too good a writer to make such elementary mistakes.
Interesting on the “Southern” effect, I wonder if language shift is faster in the North/West than the South.
Oh, cool thought! I was thinking it’s just more straightforwardly Anglo-Saxon, except for the areas with strong French influence, owing to the waves of German settlement.
was also rhyming with the ‘southern English is closer to colonial-era English than modern British English’ fun-fact that I often hear floating around.
I think the rewrite is a touch too affected. Here is my try:
And indeed I think this is simpler than the original.
As with Arjun’s reply, this is harder than you might think (though you got closer). In particular you only messed up the etymology once, but your translation is more lossy in meaning.
used etymology
This has a direct class and affectation critique of using Latinate words which wasn’t in the original, or is at most implied (a “folk from other lands” might just speak their natural tongue).
“Words that work” can imply persuasion or other reasons to select specific words, whereas the original quote was just about fluency.
I think “older” also implies different things than the anglo vs latin distinction. It also contradicts the implicit message of your quote more (since phrases like “old saw” invokes an older/more antiquated vibe).
Separately I agree my rewrite was a bit too affected. I intentionally exaggerated it for humorous effect.
I did study middle english academically, but old english was only ever a recreational interest so my anglisc is not most meet. The reason for the implied class critique is that the initial burst of latinate loans come from historic french after the norman conquest. These basically displaced and reformed old english into middle english and were imposed by the conquerors after their victory, since the conquerors spoke french. In fact, english kings wrote declarations in french until at least 1258 https://archive.org/details/onlyenglishprocl00ellirich . This created an literal class distinction between the mostly french/latin speaking court and the mostly old/middle english speaking population etc. (I am sure you know this, just justifying my choice of phrase. See also that oft repeated factoid about cow/beef, chicken/poultry etc.). It also creates a clear chronology for when latinate versus germantic influences were dominant (old english is ofc influenced by norse and the danelaw).
Since then, latin/greek has been historically used as the international language for law, religion, science and medicine, hence even more jargon coming in or being coined as latinate words. “Use” is an interesting one, however! Still, I think you could edit mine to use the word “say” instead of “use” and it would basically still work.
[EDIT: I have since been informed that there has been a re-reestablishment of non-latinate words as proper upper class speech in the UK relatively recently. Also in general the Norman conquest was a long time ago and lots of intermixing happened, take what I say with some mixing function and noise added.]
Did you use Claude for the rewrite? I think you can do a much less weird one (and what is “Walnut Folk”?) e.g.
And indeed this is a plainer style.
No, Claude’s instinct is to sound much more like you.
Though your rewrite doesn’t actually work:
plain etymology
appears etymology
Latin etymology
Walnut is from the wealhhnutu, “foreign nut.” It’s the same root as what the Germanic tribes called the Romans (and other groups, like the Celts): Wēalh. There aren’t many surviving English words of that origin, Wales/Welsh and walnut are the ones I found. Referring to Latin as Welsh would be more confusing. hence Walnut Folk, which I also thought was funny.
Also, “put on and worn out” to mean anachronism and affectation seems like a lossy translation.
That said, I do agree that my original comment could’ve been made much more simply, and thinking critically about it (including translating everything to words of Anglo root in a non-barbarous way) would’ve made it simpler. But I think the high-level thing people should be aiming towards is to speak simply and plainly, rather than aiming for non-Latinate roots.
(I didn’t disagree-vote).
I considered “Latin,” which obviously comes from Latin, but via Old English so I think it’s fine. (Note that “Anglo” also comes from Latin, so a better case is that I should have just said “English.”) I don’t think it’s necessary to come up with made-up words for other places or languages that have their own names for this purpose.
I agree that “plain” and “appear” come from Old French and those were oversights. And it shows that it’s hard to actually write this way without oversights.
Also I think “put on” means “affected” and “worn out” means “anachronistic + a specific narrative of why it’s anachronistic, i.e. because the advice became worn out.”
Maybe “Vlach” is a better option? Though it has the major downside of coming through slavic and sounding sorta out of place because of that. Similarly for “Gaul”.
Denotatively it doesn’t mean Roman or Latin! So it has the same issue with “Welsh.” Also I think “Walnut Folk” is much funnier.
it’s much closer to meaning “roman” than “walnut folk” is! romania = roman-ia = wallach-ia. it does also literally mean an eastern romance speaker, which is a subset of latin speakers, and it got that meaning from just meaning romance/latin speaker earlier