While attempting to select a rubric of my own choosing, I stumbled upon a forever chatroom/feed about one of my favorite practices: nonce-formation and de-capitalization verses capitalization; tobe or not TO BE?
And, yes this ended up for discussion at the table after dinner!
As one of my favorite colleagues constantly interjects to remind me: "mi-ja', no life."
Hot diggitydoodleness! The Way, this time, led me to a word walk in the park! Oh what fun to follow a group of malcontents online making fun of other malcontents regarding the usage of 'mayusculas and minusculas'!
Somehow, this winding road dropped me off at "the topfloorback room at 4 Patchin Place and found my old companion, 'E.E.CummingsandGoings', kindred spirit to my passion for WordArt and poetic expression. There was so much about this conventional eschewin I had filed away with my adolescent memories. Snap! It all came back! I remember the musings of his wordy waves and why I enjoyed his work so much.
Much like the agitated malcontents I was stalking online, Cummings stirred up a little friction for himself in his time. His transformation of words would soon transform the world view of avant garde writings and visual poetry, hence, modifying the rules of grammar for us all.
Norman Friedman, author of "Not 'e.e. cummings' Revisited", was one of those scholars that hovered over his linguistic inventions. He was known to comment often and vehemently.
 |
| Note: Cummings own signature |
"Although Cummings obviously does not follow conventional
usage with regard to caps and lowercase, the oft-repeated notion that he never
uses caps is pure nonsense. He uses caps all over the place, but he does not
use them in the ordinary way, and that is part of his overall typographical
strategy regarding spacing punctuation, and so on, in relation to the various
visual effects he created to reinforce meaning." - Norman Friedman.
This leads me on the road back to the malcontents. I have listed some of the gritty banter that foregrounded this unclear element market.
I believe the question at hand had everything to do with distinct personal style and proper usage of a rune. The group seemed almost hostile about the dismissal of the basic rules of writing that Kate L. Turabian so carefully illustrated in 'The Manual for Writers' a quarter of a century ago. This group came up with the following exchange...
They are
degenerates. Unable to follow a few simple rules. It is bloody aggravating to
read through and it makes the writing appear
less important by not being properly prepared.
TO OFFSET
THE PEOPLE THAT WRITE ENTIRELY IN CAPITAL LETTERS.
TO OFFSET
THE PEOPLE THAT WRITE ENTIRELY IN CAPITAL LETTERS.
Haha, I was going to make a comment like that.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
Some people do it because they are lazy. Others do it because they type too slow, and use the "hunt and peck" method of typing, meaning that shifting slows them down. Still, others do it because they do not understand the correct rules of punctuation.
Actual conversation on my friend had in class (she teaches “college prep” – a required course for high school seniors that teaches them how to research colleges and apply):
"Ms. Stockman -- I forgot, when are we supposed to start a sentence with a capital letter?"
"Every time, Jamal"
Haha, I was going to make a comment like that.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
Some people do it because they are lazy. Others do it because they type too slow, and use the "hunt and peck" method of typing, meaning that shifting slows them down. Still, others do it because they do not understand the correct rules of punctuation.
Actual conversation on my friend had in class (she teaches “college prep” – a required course for high school seniors that teaches them how to research colleges and apply):
"Ms. Stockman -- I forgot, when are we supposed to start a sentence with a capital letter?"
"Every time, Jamal"
____________________________________________________________________________________________
it's a style of write whose time is cumming
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
Cause CAP
LOCK is broken.
I write (not online, real writing) in all capital letters. I make the true
capital letters a little larger than the rest to differenciate them. My dad
writes the same way. So does my half-brother, which is weird since he didn't
grow up much around me or my dad.
It's just easier for me, and more legible. I switched from writing normally in high school after I wrote an excuse note from school for my boyfriend. I was an idiot and did it in my own writing, so I started to use all caps after I became paranoid about getting caught. But it grew to be more comfortable.
It's just easier for me, and more legible. I switched from writing normally in high school after I wrote an excuse note from school for my boyfriend. I was an idiot and did it in my own writing, so I started to use all caps after I became paranoid about getting caught. But it grew to be more comfortable.
____________________________________________________________________________________________
For whatever reason, today's dismissal for the laws of basic grammar and ideographs are very different from the art and times of Cummings. L'est not forget today's landscape is paved with texts, emails, twitterings and more devices that force character limits; hence, making it almost mandatory to fracture language. That was not the case with Cummings. His ironical selection and deselection of characters and inventive language was part of a thoughtful representation to prose. Ah, refreshing! Indeed, "No life!"
Done, this meal is over! I have traveled long enough on this post dinner discussion. The time has come to leave room for a wordy desert on another day. The reality is that the answer is unclear and like most polemics there is no true right or wrong.
AS FOR ME, Cummings' topographical expressions through word designs are visual music to my ears.
... And, I wonder... As for Patchin Place, the long standing Greenwich hideaway for artists is now called, 'Therapy Row" - Hmmm...could it be? Capitalization and de-capitalization; throwing my hands up in the air and sayin'...artful words drive me crazy too!
Norman Friedman befittingly had the following plaques placed outside of Patchin Place, posthumously.
Upper (uppercase EEC):
 |
| E.E. Cummings |
ONE-TIME HOME OF "POETandPAINTER" E. E. CUMMINGS (d. 1962) AND
HIS WIFE, MODEL AND PHOTOGRAPHER MARION MOREHOUSE (d. 1969)
"--do lovers love?why then to heaven with hell
Whatever sages say and fools;all's well"
Lower (lowercase eec):
e.e. cummings
1894-1962
The poet and painter, who made art
of commas and parentheses,
lived here for the last forty years
of his life. He characterized himself
as "an author of pictures,
a draughtsman of words."
Majuscule or minuscule? What do you prefer and why...leave a comment!
'BUENcamination'
0 comments:
Post a Comment