THE DEAF PENALTY AND SOVIET JEWELRY

posted by James Reel

This morning I received one of those Emily Litella-style e-mails complaining that we've been mispronouncing a certain Fritz Kreisler title. The correspondent insisted that it should be pronounced "lee-bes-leed," the first and last vowels being the same. Well, that would be true if the German title were "Liebeslied," or "love's song," but it's not. It's "Liebesleid," "love's sorrow"--IE (pronounced "EE") in the first syllable, EI (pronounced "I") in the last. That's very different.

I suspect there would be a lot less righteous indignation in America these days if people actually got some facts together before they began waving their misspelled protest signs...