Re: Irish.py was Re: A Conlang-L FAQ, preliminary version

Peter Clark:
> > Jack's mantle has, gratifyingly, been taken up by the returning Peter
> > Clark, poccessor of extrenuous vowels.
>
>         Gee, I misspell one word and I am suddenly nominated to
> replace Jack?
It's not so much a matter of quantity as a matter of quality. Most
misspellings are boring and slightly depressing evidence of suboptimal
standards of literacy on the part of the author and sometimes also
subeditor and editor. In cases like these -- 'dipthong', 'millenium',
'elegaic', etc etc ad nauseam -- the aetiology of the misspelling is
obvious & the resulting spelling is close to what was intended.

Slightly more entertaining would be the person who always spells
_definitely_ as _defiantly_. It's not so wonderful qua pure misspelling,
but it has a pleasing effect on the text overall.

However, when Jack wrote 'agulunulating', and you write of a 'poccessor'
and of 'extrenuous vowels' (= extraneous), you create wonderful new
mutant words. If read aloud as spelt, they do not sound like the
'intended' word, and the step from intended to actual spelling is
neither short nor obvious, and is consequently rather magical. I
promise you that for me they are not an opportunity to mock but rather
are something to savour -- among the highlights of the Conlang list.

--And.

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