Sir: Please explain how spelling errors like these can appear so often in daily newspapers:
A headline that says, "Heckler doesn't phase Gorbachev."A soap-opera summary that says, "Darryl searches for Frannie, unaware she's been pouring through his safe."
A column that twice refers to road flares as "flairs."
A column that informs a writer, "Your answer wreaks of. . . ."
A classified advertisement that offers a "French Preventional sofa."
A classified advertisement that seeks a "Cleaning Lady, 3 mournings a week."
And these are only samples. What's wrong?
- Various Readers
Answer: That's easy. Even in jobs that call for correct spelling, nobody really bothers any more. If you can put together letters that sound vaguely like the word in question, they figure, that's good enough - anyhow, a machine somewhere will straighten it all out. And if it doesn't, that's the machine's fault, right?
Sir: I learned recently that a young friend didn't even know what "gee" and "haw" mean. What's this world coming to?
- J.S.
Answer: I don't know what it's coming to, but it sounds like it's going to the bow-wows. Good night, how're we going to tell our animals which way to turn if we don't know that "gee" means right and "haw" means left?
Sir: Like others, I had always thought the Constitution guaranteed an accused person a jury of his peers. Actually, it guarantees "a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury." What's the origin of the "jury of one's peers" expression?
- Ruth F.
Answer: In England, "peers" are either (1) any equals or (2) nobles. The original importance of the phrase was that nobles could demand to be tried by other nobles, who might go easy on them. We're lucky to have escaped the confusion, aren't we?
TOUGH REQUEST of the week, spotted by Henry R.: "A writer to the Consumer Action column in my newspaper reported: `I have asked that a representative come and look at the problem for four weeks.' Wow! That's a lot of looking at a problem!"