Tackling a stinker of a language
JUNE CASAGRANDE
For the last few weeks, I’ve been reading two books: “The Iliad,”
which makes me sound smart but feel dumb, and Stephen King’s “The
Stand,” which has the opposite effect. The former is a classic tale
of men who, for various reasons, want to kill men and attack and
enslave women. The latter is a less-respected work about men who, for
various reasons, want to kill men and attack and enslave women.
The former is readable to me mainly because Hollywood’s recent
popcorn epic “Troy” helps me to picture Brad Pitt as a barely clad
Achilles. (An added plus: In the future, every time I mention Homer,
people won’t be able to automatically assume I’m referring to a
cartoon character.) “The Stand,” on the other hand, doesn’t conjure
up any images of male sex symbols, unless you think Stephen King was
really hot in his Cameo in “Creepshow.” King’s “The Stand” isn’t the
breezy read you might think. It was so long -- 1,150 pages -- that
the library wouldn’t allow me to renew it anymore and I had to cram
until wee hours of the night to avoid the dreaded 50-cent late fee.
Normally, I wouldn’t ‘fess up to such psychologically
unjustifiable reading material, but I happened to notice a little
something in these books that I found interesting. In the span of
just a few days, I noticed that a character in “The Stand” was said
to “speak his piece.” In “The Iliad,” a group of soldiers all “held
their peace.”
There’s something I’d never noticed before. When you talk, the
thing you’re speaking is your “piece.” But, when staying quiet, what
you’re withholding is your “peace.”
Isn’t English a stinker?
None of my reference books discuss these expressions. Ironically,
when I looked it up in “Garner’s Modern American Usage,” I stumbled
upon a similarly evil language trap.
It’s “peace of mind,” but, “piece of (one’s) mind,” as in, “I’m
going to give you a piece of my mind and then I’ll have peace of
mind.”
Yes, English is a stinker. But it’s rare for me to find my own
examples in books. Most of the time I rely on readers to point these
things out. (Thank Zeus for you readers!) And this week’s
reader-observed example of why English is a stinker comes from Tom in
La Crescenta. He points out that a recent LA Times article about
travel in Mexico mentions “wooden choir stalls,” yet later notes,
“The gift shop has wood sculptures.”
Tom asks: “Since both things being described are made of wood, why
the different word? Is one description more correct than the other,
or are they both OK?”
And, like many people who aspire to get a better grasp of the
language, Tom tacks on a little disclaimer, “Perhaps this is a naive
question, since I am definitely not a grammarian, just curious.”
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Nine out of 10 times we
think our language questions are a result of our own inadequacy, it
turns out that not even the experts know the answers. Or if they do,
they’re not telling, leaving the rest of us as divided and conquered
as a group of Trojans just discovering the trap doors in their new
toy horse.
None of my usage books contain listings for “wood” versus
“wooden.” So I’ll form my own answer from the information in the
dictionary. “Wooden” is an adjective. “Wood” is a primarily a noun,
but is also an adjective meaning (brace yourselves) “wooden.”
In fact, many nouns can be used as adjectives. For example,
“grass” is a noun, but in “grass hut,” it’s an adjective.
Therefore, Tom, the answer to your question is, yes. Both “wood”
and “wooden” are OK. Sure, that’s sort of a stinker in that having
two interchangeable words can lead to confusion. But at the same time
it’s kind of a relief. In fact, this stinker language can be pretty
forgiving as long as we remember there’s no such thing as a stupid
question. Only stupid reading habits.
* JUNE CASAGRANDE is a freelance writer. She can be reached at
JuneTCN@aol.com.