A Humorous Sojourn

This week I began my "T" books, starting with a popular book about punctuation (!) by Lynne Truss, Eats, Shoots and Leaves.  It was very funny and very well written!  I had been given it as a gift years ago (since it came out in 2004, it was probably 9 years), and never gotten around to reading it.  Its audience seems to be puncto-philes (I'm making that word up) or even puncto-fanatics, which means I'm the perfect person to read it.  Fortunately for the publisher, it was, as they claim on the book's jacket, "a runaway bestseller," much to the author's astonishment.

I enjoyed reading about her exasperation at the signs we see every day--supposedly to communicate an important message--that are atrociously punctuated, and at the alarming increase in poorly punctuated emails and other such published writings that should be more carefully composed and proofread. It was heartening to realize I'm not alone!

But if someone were reading it just to learn about punctuation, I think the book would be less than ideal. The author tends to get into the weeds about how words should be punctuated, ending up discussing all the exceptions to the rules, something that, I've learned, confuses puncto-phobic people to the point where they throw up their hands and say, "Well, it doesn't really matter, then, does it?" That's not exactly the result Ms. Truss and I are looking for.

But if you just want a laugh about how language is constantly evolving and sometimes stumbling on its way to communication, you'll enjoy this book as I did.

Since that was a short book, I was able to start another on the "T" list, this time a novel by Mark Twain, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court.  I had read the book many years ago, but don't really remember it.  I've also seen the movie starring Bing Crosby, but don't remember much about it, either, other than that there was singing, as there always is with Bing Crosby movies.  The story involves a factory worker in late-nineteenth-century Hartford, CT who is hit on the head with a crowbar, and when he comes to, finds himself in King Arthur's court. Since the character, Hank Morgan, is a pragmatic sort of fellow, he makes the most of his time-travel.  And since Twain is telling the story, he does it in a very comical way.

In the years since reading the book the first time, I've studied the history of the middle ages, so I'm enjoying the book in a different way this time, appreciating how Twain is making fun of that era as well as his own.  It's a funny thing about Twain: I always forget what a good writer he was! Once I get used to the late nineteenth-century style of writing (rather full and florid, as a rule), I find myself thoroughly entertained by Twain's clever way of looking at the world and its people.

So, two humorous books in a row ain't a bad thing!  I'll let you know how our Connecticut Yankee fares in the next installment.