Work, Play, Wordplay

AN OCEAN WHERE ALL'S ACCUSTOMED, CEREMONIOUS

As Far As the I Can Sea
For cruise reading earlier this month, I took along Lolita, which has been on my "to read" list for 40 years or so. After the first few pages of Humbert Humbert's clever alliterative word sequences, I thought back to the time when I set out to write a paper about Work, Play, and Wordplay in the short story "Araby." I never tire of re - reading this story of illusion and disillusion:

"The cold air stung us and we played till our bodies glowed. Our shouts echoed in the silent street. The career of our play brought us through the dark muddy lanes behind the houses, where we ran the gauntlet of the rough tribes from the cottages, to the back doors of the dark dripping gardens . . .

"I answered few questions in class. I watched my master's face pass from amiability to sternness; he hoped I was not beginning to idle. I could not call my wandering thoughts together. I had hardly any patience with the serious work of life which, now that it stood between me and my desire, seemed to me child's play, ugly monotonous child's play. . . .

"My uncle said he was very sorry he had forgotten. He said he believed in the old saying: 'All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.' "
James Joyce ~"Araby" ~ Dubliners ~ 1914

"The career of our play" -- there is just something so pleasing about that phrase and the use of "career" to mean a crazy path -- not a life - work trajectory. Even though I know that Joyce meant play, I still thought of work -- as does the boy's uncle. After all, the narrator of "Araby" is a very serious boy, earnest and task - oriented, who merges work and play. He is not looking for fun at the bazaar, he is on a quest.

Likewise, I know the boys in the story were rushing headlong around the neighborhood -- careering. But perhaps they were also tilting and veering -- careening. Work Play Career Careen. How enmeshed are these linguistic connections? Word Detective explains the etymology:

Although “careen” and “career” as verbs are often used interchangeably today, they are, in fact, quite separate words. Strictly speaking, “careen” [Latin root = “carina" = “keel of a ship”] means “to lean over, to tilt,” while “career” [Latin root = “carrus” = “wheeled vehicle”] as a verb means “to rush at full speed” (with implications of recklessness). . . .

“Career” as a verb meaning “to move at full speed” is actually the same word as the noun “career” meaning “profession or course of employment or activity.” . . .

Interestingly, “careen” and “career” began to be used interchangeably only in the early 20th century, just about the time people noticed that a motor car rounding a curve at high speed (“careering”) tended to tilt quite a bit (“careening”). Purists still draw a distinction between the two words, but it’s really a losing battle at this point.

At long last I realize what would have saved the day for my rejected paper proposal -- having read Lolita 35 years ago instead of waiting until now! If only I had done so, I could have bolstered my argument with numerous examples from Nabokov, the Master of Wordplay! Some of my favorites:

43: "Monsieur Poe - poe," as that boy . . . called the poet - poet

43, 81: a swim in Our Glass Lake . . . Hourglass Lake -- not as I had thought it was spelled

50: she denies those amusing rumors, rumor, roomer

53: Haze, Dolores . . . dolorous and hazy

54: creeping . . . crippling

57, 60: Humbert the Hummer . . . Humbert the Hound

60: Carmen - barmen . . . barmen, alarmin', my charmin', my carmen, ahmen, ahhamen . . .

70: the dreadful, mysterious, insidious words "trauma," "traumatic event," and "transom"

71: I might blackmail -- no, that is too strong a word -- mauvemail

77: ecru and ocher and putty - buff - snuff

92: Campus, Canada, Candid Camera, Candy . . . Canoeing or Canvasback

112: Anyway, something abdominal. Abominable? No, adominal.

114: "Ensuite?" . . . "Ansooit . . . "

118: not Humberg and not Humbug, but Herbert, I mean Humbert . . .
118: "I think it went to the Swoons," said Swine . . .

Unfortunately, as with Catcher in the Rye, I came late to Lolita. Otherwise, I might have used Nabokov's examples of connective wordplay to substantiate my own: work play career careen. Or as Humbert Humbert himself might have elaborated: Career Careen Cartoon Cardoon.

Not forgetting Bill Bryson's travel suggestion to "carom about the country in any pattern you wished"! Or William Kent Krueger writing that the "July brilliance caromed off the floor and smacked the wall" (Ordinary Grace, 237). And similarly from A Gentleman in Moscow: "He also had a whole host of entertaining alternatives to the phrase enable and ensure, ranging from bustle and trundle to carom and careen" (69 - 70, emphasis added).

If one well - placed word brings to mind another, follow the connection and see what happens! Who knows what truth may be revealed by the time you reach then end of the chain? Never mind the naysayers and killjoys; no vocabulary connection is without merit.

After reading Lolita at sea, it is now time to re - read Reading Lolita in Tehran. No doubt, thanks to my new, improved understanding of Nabokov, many previously missed connections will fall into place. Coincidences are always there for the taking. Connections are always there for the making.

". . . to the Bermudas or the Bahamas or the Blazes."
(Lolita, 36)

Wordplay from previous / future posts . . .

Len Lent Lentils

Cat, Bat, Batman, Batuman, Batground

Annecharico, Carrigan Carrillo, Carriker, O'Kereke

Carnage, Carnival ~ Strangled, Estranged

********************

Cerebral Typos . . .
When I meant THOUGH, I added a final "T" and typed THOUGHT.
When I meant THIN, I added a final "K" and typed THINK.

********************

Gerry's Cruise Reading:
Every Man Dies Alone by Hans Fallada

SEE YOU IN TWO WEEKS ON MY
Next Fortnightly Post
Wednesday, March 15th ~ "Beware the Ides of March!"

Between now and then, read
THE QUOTIDIAN KIT
my shorter, almost daily blog posts
www.dailykitticarriker.blogspot.com

Looking for a good book? Try
KITTI'S LIST ~ "Short Books for a Short Month"
my running list of recent reading
www.kittislist.blogspot.com

A Horse Is At Least Human

ACCUSTOMED, CEREMONIOUS

Spring Break in England 2008
Looking Through the Windshield, near Liverpool

Above: Yes, there are still those who trundle to the speed of a different wheel! As Ghandi said, "There is more to life than increasing its speed." Left: Here we are heading off to college in our Dodge Dart. Now, just exactly what color is this car? Forest Green, Jungle Green, Pine Green? Tropical Rain Forest? Maybe Asparagus or Fern.
[See my previous post:
"Burnt Sienna"]



Before the Burnt Sienna Omni, there was the Dart (please feel free to pronounce as Click and Clack do: Dartre--to rhyme with Sartre). When my twin brother Bruce and I started our second year of college, our parents got us this car with a standard shift on the column, a nightmare for me since I had failed at every attempt to learn about shifting gears. So one Friday in late September, my brother decided to teach me a lesson. We had lined up a few girls from my dorm to make the four - hour drive home for the weekend with us and chip in for gas. Bruce usually kept the car over at his dorm, so on Friday afternoon, he pulled up at the appointed time to pick us all up.

As we were piling all our stuff in the trunk, he announced, "I think I'll just stay here for the weekend, Kit; you go on home." I had no idea how I was going to drive that car, but I couldn't disappoint those girls at the VERY last moment. So after berating my traitorous brother, who merely shrugged his shoulders and trudged off across campus, the rest of us got in, and I guess my riders hung on to their seats while I ground the gears all the way home. Anyway, I learned. And the old Dartre nearly got us through college.

Dorm Girls, Heading Home for the Weekend, Fall 1976
Going back even further, there was my dad's Station Wagon, the one I crashed when driving home from highschool band practice on a Saturday afternoon, on the county roads out where we lived (lots of accidents out there). I shudder, even now, thinking of how I might have killed myself, my sister, and those two other kids. Sometimes I wonder what on earth our elders were thinking! Couldn't any of them have given us a ride? For some reason, my mom's car, the one that I drove more often, was not available that morning, and I protested when my parents said I should drive the other car, rather than have one of them drive us there and back. Filled with reluctance (and fear), not used to power brakes and steering, I was a nervous wreck waiting to happen.

Distracted for a fleeting instant -- when one of the others in the car said, "Why is there a school bus out on a Saturday" and pointed off to the right -- I barely edged off the right side of the road. As soon as I felt that gravel shoulder under my tires, I steered left to get back on the road, over - corrected, and ended up in the left lane, heading straight at another car. I totally panicked, over - corrected again -- back to the right this time, went beyond my lane, across the right shoulder (where I had been the first time), and crashed right into a telephone pole, which broke in half, dangling dangerously over the car.

And that was in broad day - light, stone - cold sober! Yet another scary statistic of a teen-ager driving with other teens in the car. Not good!

As you could probably guess, after surviving the crash, my passengers and I were entirely heedless of any electrical issues, and all jumped right out of the car and ran to the nearest farm house to call my parents. Luckily, we weren't electrocuted, on top of everything else. I know my parents paid for the replacement of that telephone pole, which was NOT covered under our insurance. They were cross for a little while but went easy on me, knowing that I had very specifically, not to mention tearfully, requested a ride from them.

Shortly after the accident, my dad found a cartoonish advertisement for a corny movie entitled "Kitty Can't Help It." The caption read: "She doesn't mean to drive men wild, but Kitty can't help it." Well, my dad cut this ad out of the paper, crossed out the word "men" and changed the "y" to "i" to make it like my name: "She doesn't mean to drive wild, but Kitti can't help it" Hahaha!

I laughed and laughed and so did everyone else. That cartoon must have stayed on our refrigerator for the next ten years. I wish somewhere along the way I had pasted it into my scrapbook for safe keeping, but I'll never forget it anyway, so I guess that's about the same. That was my father's humor! Plus, that's how I knew I was forgiven for my recklessness.

Another way I knew was that a mere seven days after the accident, my parents needed something from the store and told me to go hop in the rental car (that we were using while the station wagon was being repaired) and run and get it. I did NOT want to do this, but they insisted. I was not allowed to refuse or convince myself that it was impossible. No more avoidance. "You can do it," they said. And I did it.

But that doesn't mean I enjoyed it. I share Holden Caulfield's skepticism of the automobile: "Take most people, they're crazy about cars. They worry if they get a little scratch on them, and they're always talking about how many miles they get to a gallon, and if they get a brand-new car already they start thinking about trading it in for one that's even newer. I don't even like old cars. I mean they don't even interest me. I'd rather have a goddamn horse. A horse is at least human, for God's sake" (from Catcher in the Rye, Chapter 17).

And Holden Caulfied isn't the only one. Although I can't recall a time in my life when I didn't know what a car was, I can understand perfectly the qualms of startled little Chiyo when she is first exposed to the hectic streets of Kyoto: "I'd never seen a car before. I'd seen photographs, but remember being surprised at how...well, cruel, is the way they looked to me in my frightened state, as though they were designed to hurt people more than to help them. All my senses were assaulted" (Memoirs of a Geisha, italics Golden's, 35). Like Chiyo, I've never really overcome the apprehension that when it comes to cars danger is lurking everywhere.

Quiz Time:

I am most afraid of: Losing a loved one in a car accident; even worse, being the cause of that accident.

My favorite car is: One with a driver.

I never really got the hang of: Driving.

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