Many people argue that English spelling is terrible. George Bernard Shaw reckoned that the English "spell it so abominably that no man can teach himself what it sounds like." It is easy to find words liketheir/there/they'rewith the same sounds but different spellings. Some words have unique spellings all of their own, such ascolonelandyacht.Fifteen-year-olds can't write ten lines without making at least one spelling mistake, and adults struggle with words such asaccommodateandbroccoliall their lives.

By contrast, Noam Chomsky, the greatest linguist of our time, claims the current spelling of English is "a near optimal system." He feels that spelling that departs from the pronunciation sometimes helps us to understand what we are reading. Silent letters like the "g" insignconnect one word to other words in which the letters are not silent, likesignature;the fact that the past tense ending "-ed" is said in three different ways, "t"(liked),"d"(played),"id"(waited)but written only as "-ed,"makes clear their common meaning.

The difference between Shaw and Chomsky comes down to how they think spelling works. One of its functions is indeed to show the sounds of words. The worddoglinks the letters to the sounds one by one -- "d," "o" and "g." Italian and Finnish use such links virtually all the time. But in English the correspondence between letters and sounds is usually far less straightforward. Sometimes one letter corresponds to several sounds; the letter "a," for instance, has three different sounds inbrat, bravoandbrave.Sometimes two letters link to one sound -- the "th" inthinor the "ng" inwrong.The sequence of letters can be out of step with the sequence of sounds; the "u" inguessshows the pronunciation of the letter "g," which occurs beforeit. Our problems with spelling are often due to not knowing the rules, say the doubling of "c" and "m" inaccommodationor the consonants that go before particular vowels --cemetery("c" is pronounced "s" before "e") versuscamel("c" is pronounced "k" before "a").

With some written symbols, you either know what they mean or you don't, say "$," "#" or "%." You can't use the spelling to work out how they are said. The second function of spelling is, then, to show what words mean. Common words liketheandofconnect directly to their meanings in our minds, rather than being converted into sounds letter by letter. Unique words have to be remembered as one-off spellings, such assapphireorchamois(shammy leather). Some systems of writing, like Chinese, work primarily by linking whole symbols to meanings in this way. To use English spelling, you have not only to connect letters and sounds but also to remember a host of individual words, whether frequent ones likeanor unusual ones likesupersede.In other words, English uses spelling both for sounds, as assumed by Shaw, and for meaning, as believed by Chomsky.

English spelling is far more systematic than most people suspect. The best-known rule, "I before e except after c," applies to only eleven out of the 10,000 most common words of English -- eight forms ofreceive,plusceiling, receiptandperceive.Other less familiar rules work far better, for instance the rule that a surname with the same pronunciation as an ordinary word can take a double consonant,PittandCarrrather than pit and car, or have an extra "e,"GreeneandWildeinstead of green and wild.

The great asset of English has always been its flexibility. Starting with a stock of letters borrowed from the Romans, the Irish and German tribes, it has evolved with the English language for 1,500 years. In the Old English spoken by the Anglo-Saxons every letter corresponded to a sound in words such asfaeder(father) andriht(right). After 1066 the system had to cope with a deluge of words derived from French and Latin, such astricherie(treachery) andnice.Over the centuries it has adapted words from many other languages, includingcoffeefrom Arabic and Turkish,broccolifrom Italian andsushifrom Japanese. Whatever the language a word comes from, English spelling can handle it.

At the same time, the pronunciation of English has been changing. Some Old English sounds died out: the "h" (pronounced like Scottish "loch") inrihtbecame the silent "gh" inright.Long vowels changed their pronunciation between Chaucer and Shakespeare:winewas once said aswean,stoneasstan.Punctuation marks were introduced and their use gradually stabilized, the apostrophe last and most eccentric of all. Because of the changing pronunciation, the rules linking letters and sounds became more complicated and the number of eccentric individual words people had to remember increased. The sound-based spelling of the past tense inbarkt, changdand parted gave way to the uniform meaning-based spelling "ed" inbarked, changedand parted.

All this change and outside influence has meant that English spelling now presents a rich set of possibilities for our use and entertainment. Pop musicians call themselvesThe Beatles, EminemandSugababes.Novelists hint at dialects,ax(ask) andtole(told), and think up unusual book titles --Pet Semetary(Stephen King). Owners invent names for drugs likeZyrtecand for racehorses likeSale the Atlantic.

It is indeed important for the international use of English that it isnottoo closely tied to speech. People from Houston, Glasgow, Hong Kong or Bristol understand each other's writing but might well not understand each other's speech. Much world business uses written English although the writers are not native speakers. Over three quarters of research papers in biology are written in English, and more than half of all Web pages. Spelling and punctuation seldom betray whether an English-language newspaper comes from Santiago, Kuala Lumpur or Jerusalem, apart from the choice between American and British styles of spelling in words likelabor/labour.

So do we need to get excited about the mistakes that people make with spelling? Mistakes don't necessarily prevent our understanding the message. We still know whatextasy, Mens Toiletsorenglandmean. Spell checkers can now handle most of these mistakes without any trouble. A mistake that interferes with the meaning of the message is more serious. The writer may need help or the spelling system itself may need modifying. Yet we hardly notice similar problems in speech: people are not sent to speech therapy for mispronouncing odd words. No one suggests thatspokenEnglish should be reformed because some people find it hard to say "th" sounds. The most talented writers make spelling mistakes. Keats once spelledfruitasfuruit,Walt Whitman wrotedepressedasdeprestand Hemingway wroteprofessionalasproffessional.Does this detract in any way from their achievements?

Our discussions of spelling often suggest that there is an ideal of perfect spelling that people should strive for. Correct spelling and punctuation are seen as injunctions carved on tablets of stone: to break them is to transgress the tacit commandments for civilized behavior. Spelling and punctuation can become an emotional rather than rational area of dispute. No individual or institution has ever had the right to lay down the rules of English spelling. Nor are public discussions usually based on accounts of how modern spelling actually works, but on the traditional rules handed down from the grammarians of the eighteenth century. Attempts to meddle with the spelling without this kind of factual basis have often been disastrous in the past, landing us with the "b" ofdebtand the "c" ofscissors.

The English writing system is the rich and fertile creation of those who use English. Its rules are the ongoing living response to how people express their ideas in writing in an ever-developing and changing world. Rather than continually carping about the decline of the English language, as people have been doing since at least the sixteenth century, we should try to understand and develop the amazing resource that is available to us.

This book, then, celebrates the richness and resourcefulness of English spelling, taking examples from real-life use. Its contents are not set out in any particular sequence. There are tests on various aspects of spelling with answers at the back. Also at the back is a thematic guide for those who want to follow particular themes such as novel spellings, spelling mistakes or the history of spelling.

© & copy 2004 by Vivian Cook & Robert Cook

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Excerpted from Accomodating Brocolli in the Cemetary: Or Why Can't Anybody Spell? by Vivian Cook
All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.