Editorial
Front Page - Friday, April 2, 2010
I Swear...
More oxymora and some miscellany
Vic Fleming
“Dear Judge Vic,” someone writes. “You left out a category of oxymorons.”
The writer’s note is apropos of my three-part series, just ended two weeks ago, on oxymora – words, phrases, concepts that contain, internally and/or externally, contradictions or seeming contradictions.
“So what did you omit? You omitted names, and possibly other single words, that consist of or contain contradictory words. For instance, Alfred NOYES, an English poet who lived from 1880-1958, whose last name is NO and YES, joined at the hip. Or at the O and the Y, as it were. Are there others?”
“Are there others?” she asks, after pointing out a category that I was ignorant of. Had she but done the research, I’d have gladly reprinted it, right here in mid-column. And given her credit.
Ironically, for over a year now, I have known someone whose last name is an oxymoron of this sort.
As compared with NOYES, which rhymes with TOYS, my friend’s name goes the game one better, because the contradictory words are pronounced as they should be. She also has the unusual characteristic of having a first name/last name combination that starts with A and ends with Z. I’m not sure what that’s called.
She is an English professor at New York University, and a regionally known lyricist. Her name? AMANDA YESNO-WITZ, the last name being pronounced just like it looks.
Richard Lederer, mentioned in the earlier columns, calls this category “logological oxymora,” and he includes the word NOOK, with the poet’s last name, NOYES, as the only two examples, I think.
•••
“Dear Judge Vic,
“Did you know that Richard Lederer wrote a book of crossword puzzles? Why don’t you and Skip Rutherford get him to come to the next Clinton School Puzzle Festival?”
Hmm, the writer makes a great point.
And, in researching matters, I see that Lederer and one Gayle Dean authored “Merriam-Webster's Word Play Cross-words,” 50 themed puzzles with lots of word play involved. (Thus, the title…)
By the way, I’ve recently had the good fortune to speak with Lederer, who has a new book coming out this autumn, “A Treasury for Seniors.”
His most current books are “A Treasury for Dog Lovers” and “A Treasury for Cat Lovers.”
Lederer, who currently resides in San Diego, has been profiled in The New Yorker, People and the National Enquirer. He appears on radio as a commentator on language.
His books include “Anguished English,” “More Anguished English,” “The Bride of Anguished English,” ”The Revenge of Anguished English,” “The Giant Book of Animal Jokes,” “Get Thee To a Punnery,” “Word Wizard,” “Comma Sense” and “Sleeping Dogs Don't Lay (and That's No Lie).”
I’ll keep you posted as to whether Mr. Lederer will grace our state with his presence at this year’s puzzle festival.
Vic Fleming is a district court judge in Little Rock, Arkansas, where he also teaches at the William H. Bowen School of Law. Contact him at judgevic@comcast.net.
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