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Play a little What is common to Malayalam, step on no pets, radar and live not on evil? Simple, they are all palindromes or words and phrases that can be read backward and forward without any change in meaning. A twist to the usual palindrome is the sentence that consists of words that remain in their original places even if you read the sentence in reverse. Here are two such ‘pseudodromes’: bores are people that say that people are bores and, God knows man, what is doubtful is what man knows God. Can you create one? Learn a little A good dictionary by your bedside is the only material you need for speaking well. It has been seen by experienced teachers that once the ear is sensitised to the finer differences between varied versions of word pronunciation, the rest follows naturally. The phonetic alphabet in the first few pages may look like Greek initially, but once you read it along with the examples given, you can master the phonetic symbols provided for every sound in all words. There is no need to memorise it, just be familiar with it because you can turn to it as and when required. The bedside is a good location for a dictionary because normally, one tends to think of speaking bloomers while turning in for the night! Precise usage ‘Wish’ and ‘hope’ are often used like synonyms. But there is a difference of kind, if not of degree. When you wish for something, there is an element of uncertainty; remember the expression, ‘if wishes were horses, beggars would ride’. So, you can say, ‘I wish there were no wars in this world’. But, if you know that something can easily happen, you would say, ‘I hope there will be some peace in the world soon’. Intriguing words Many writers have given new words to the English language by either coining them or making such words common that existed earlier but were not used much. William Shakespeare did both these things and these are some such words that owe their existence to him: critic, dislocate, blanket, eyeball, fixture, impede, gossip, ode, lonely, mimic, unreal, summit, swagger and madcap. |
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