Re: Simple English

"Grandsire, C.A." wrote:

>         Wasn't that the purpose of Basic English? IIIRC, it is a subset of 800
> roots from English and a regularized grammar.
The grammar remained unchanged.

> And IIRC again, its main
> flaw was to replace words (like to succeed) by expressions (here 'to
> make good') that you had to learn separately anyway as there was no
> obvious connections between the meaning of the expression and the
> meaning of its elements. Am I right?
Yes, indeed.  Here are some horrible examples showing the "awkward and
ridiculous circumlocutions" that Basic makes necessary:

Standard: He scratched his cheek.
Basic: He cut the side of his face.

Standard: He hurt his forehead.
Basic: He did damage to the part of his face between his hair and eyes.

Standard: She had lost her handkerchief.
Basic: She was unable to come across the square of linen used for blowing
        her nose.

Standard: He does not shave every day.
Basic: He does not take hair off his face every day.

Standard: Feel my pulse.
Basic: Take the rate of my heart.

Standard: Put the chair in the corner.
Basic: Put the seat with back for one person in the angle between the two
        walls.

Standard: He can play the piano.
Basic: He is albe to make music on an instrument in which stretched wires
        are given blows by hammers worked from keys.
        (Shades of the alleged Pidgin-English word for "piano":
        big-fella-box-you-hit-im-teeth-he-cry!)

Standard: She is a widow.
Basic: She is a woman not married again after the death of the man she
        was married to.

Standard: The priest thanked the ladies.
Basic: The servant of the church said it was very good of the women of good
        birth to give him help.

Standard: The officer led his soldiers against the enemy.
Basic: The person in military authority was the guide of his men in the army
        against the nation at war.

--

Schlingt dreifach einen Kreis vom dies! || John Cowan <jcowan@...>
Schliesst euer Aug vor heiliger Schau,  || http://www.reutershealth.com
Denn er genoss vom Honig-Tau,           || http://www.ccil.org/~cowan
Und trank die Milch vom Paradies.            -- Coleridge (tr. Politzer)