[lit-ideas] Grice's Shaggy Dog

"shaggy dog story", "a lengthy tediously detailed story of an
inconsequential series of events, more amusing to the teller than to his  
audience, or
amusing only by its pointlessness; also shaggy dog yarn, etc."

1937 Esquire May 56/1

One of the more sporting ways of finding out which ones are not [sane] is
to try *shaggy-dog stories on them.

1952 A. R. K. BARNARD in A. Redman Somewhat ‘Shaggy’ 4

The comparatively recent type of story the ‘Shaggy Dog’ yarn.

1952 A. KOESTLER Arrow in Blue I. viii. 68 The people of Budapest have a
peculiar shaggy-dog kind of humour.

1958 Listener 16 Oct. 623/1

It was a shaggy-dog story about a small-town worthy who shams madness to
avoid paying bills.

1972 P. RUELL Red Christmas xi. 102

He seemed to be in the middle of an autobiographical shaggy-dog  story.

-----


Parlato: Cara, cosa mi succede stasera, ti guardo ed è come la prima volta
Canto : Che cosa sei, che cosa sei, che cosa sei
Parlato: Non vorrei  parlare
Canto: Cosa sei
Parlato: Ma tu sei la frase d’amore cominciata e  mai finita
Canto: Non cambi mai, non cambi mai, non cambi mai
Parlato:  Tu sei il mio ieri, il mio oggi
Canto: Proprio mai
Parlato: È il mio  sempre, inquietudine
Canto: Adesso ormai ci puoi provare/ chiamami tormento  dai, già che ci sei
Parlato: Tu sei come il vento che porta i violini e le  rose
Canto: Caramelle non ne voglio più
Parlato: Certe volte non ti  capisco
Canto: Le rose e violini/ questa sera raccontali a un’altra,
violini e rose li posso sentire/ quando la cosa mi va se mi va,
quando è  il momento/ e dopo si vedrà
Parlato: Una parola ancora
Canto: Parole,  parole, parole
Parlato: Ascoltami
Canto: Parole, parole, parole
Parlato: Ti prego
Canto: Parole, parole, parole
Parlato: Io ti giuro
Canto: Parole, parole, parole, parole parole soltanto parole, parole tra
noi
Parlato: Ecco il mio destino, parlarti, parlarti come la prima volta
Canto: Che cosa sei, che cosa sei, che cosa sei,
Parlato: No, non dire  nulla, c’è la notte che parla
Canto: Cosa sei
Parlato: La romantica  notte
Canto: Non cambi mai, non cambi mai, non cambi mai
Parlato: Tu sei  il mio sogno proibito
Canto: Proprio mai
Parlato: È vero, speranza
Canto: Nessuno più ti può fermare/ chiamami passione dai, hai visto mai
Parlato: Si spegne nei tuoi occhi la luna e si accendono i grilli
Canto:  Caramelle non ne voglio più
Parlato: Se tu non ci fossi bisognerebbe  inventarti
Canto: La luna ed i grilli/ normalmente mi tengono sveglia/
mentre io voglio dormire e sognare/ l’uomo che a volte c’è in te quando c’
è/
che parla meno/ ma può piacere a me
Parlato: Una parola ancora
Canto: Parole, parole, parole
Parlato: Ascoltami
Canto: Parole,  parole, parole
Parlato: Ti prego
Canto: Parole, parole, parole
Parlato: Io ti giuro
Canto: Parole, parole, parole, parole parole  soltanto parole, parole tra
noi
Parlato: Che cosa sei
Canto: Parole,  parole, parole
Parlato: Che cosa sei
Canto: Parole, parole, parole
Parlato: Che cosa sei
Canto: Parole, parole, parole
Parlato: Che  cosa sei
Canto: Parole, parole, parole, parole parole soltanto parole,  parole tra
noi

Geary, who should speak Italian more often, finds /w@:d/ a tricky  word.
Joan Sutherland, who was born in Australia, but would only sing in Italian
said, "English you cannot sing at the Covent Garden. Take the word 'word'.
What  vowel hides between that semivowel and the liquid. Certainly an
impossibility  for Bellini to set."

Bellini, in fact, when in London, could not understand his own lyrics as
pronounced by English-speakers, and he made pretty derogatory comments on the
 sound qualities of the English language. (Which I don't necessarily agree
with).

Anyway,

There is a function that the OED allows, indeed, a section of the word
definition _before_ the etymology, which the OED calls 'spelling variants'
(actually, 'spellngs'). It's not a section I necessarily study but I did this
time.

Geary will be pleased to know that the list contains both his 'wird' and
his 'werd'. The OED gives frequency and issoglossic geography:

'wird', the OED notes, is "now chiefly north. and north-east) and it has
been found as from the 18th century.

'werd' is to be found, generally, as from the seventeenth century.

The complete spellings from 'word' are:

Forms: OE

uord

(chiefly Northumbrian), OE

uuord

(rare), OE (rare)


werd

,OE (rare)-eME

weord

, OE (Northumbrian)-eME

woerd

, OE-eME

wor

(rare), OE-16

wurd

, OE-

word

, lOE

wor

(perh. transmission error), eME

worth

(rare), eME

wur

(rare), ME

owrdes

(plural, transmission error), ME

worder

(transmission error), ME

wored

, ME

wort

, ME

wores

 (plural, perh. transmission error), ME

wourd

, ME

wourde

, ME

wrd

, ME

wrode

 (prob. transmission error), ME

wuord

, ME

wyrd

, ME (17 nonstandard)

vord

, ME-15

wurde

, ME-16

woord

, ME-16

woorde

, ME-16

wordd

, ME-16

worde

, 15

wordde

; U.S. regional 18-

wud

, 19-

woid

(New York), 19-

wu'd

; Eng. regional 18-

wod

(Yorks. and Lincs.), 18-

woo'd

(Leics.), 18-

wud

, 18-

wurd

 (north-west.), 19-

wodd

(Lincs.), 19-

worrd

(Westmorland); Sc. pre-17

uoord

, pre-17

uorde

, pre-17

 vard

(prob. transmission error), pre-17

vord

, pre-17

vorde

, pre-17

vourd

, pre-17

woird

, pre-17

woord

, pre-17

woorde

, pre-17

worde

, pre-17

wourd

, pre-17

wourde

, pre-17

wowrd

, pre-17 17-

word

, pre-17 18-

wird

 (now chiefly north. and north-east.), 17

werd

, 18-

ward

, 18-

wurd

; also Irish English 18

wurrd

, 19-

wurd.

-----

As for the _semantics_, it's best to stick to Greek "logos"?, or better,
Latin "verbum", before it attained the conotation of 'verb'. "Parabola" (It.
parola) is of course confusing and most likely _wrong_.

The OED does its best to define 'word' but fails.

1959 Language 35 275 To every word (i.e. word-type, not each occurrence of
the ‘same’ word) in a very long text may be assigned a probability of
occurrence.


Grice never cared for 'word' meaning -- He considers only two words in his
long career -- what he calls a 'shaggy dog' story for word meaning.

The words are 'subject-position', 'dog' and predicate-position,  'shaggy':

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED (final sections, on 'word' meaning) from

Studies in the way of words - Google Books Result  by Paul Grice -  1989 -
Philosophy - 394 pages
Utterer's Meaning, Sentence-Meaning, and  Word-Meaning This essay analyzes
in greater detail members of the quartet of  specific conceptions of meaning
which  ...
books.google.com/books?isbn=0674852710... -

Cheers,

J. L. Speranza
   Buenos Aires, Argentina
**************Make your summer sizzle with fast and easy recipes for the
grill. (http://food.aol.com/grilling?ncid=emlcntusfood00000004)
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