Span
Posted in Linguistic Annoyances at 10:56 pm on 11 August 2008
I know it’s in the dictionary but it’s marked archaic damn it! That means it hasn’t been in use more or less since printing came to Europe. So why am I reading it in a contemporary novel? Why am I reading it in a Science Fiction novel?
Come on guys and gals. It just sounds so wrong. The modern word is spun. Let’s leave span for gaps, bridges and hands. OK?
Tags: Linguistic Annoyances
The Opposite of Span - A Son of the Rock -- Jack Deighton
September 10, 2008 at 3:17 pm
[...] is almost the reverse of the case of span (see a previous annoyances post) except that rather than being full past tenses (preterites,) sunk and shrunk are now, in the main, [...]
redRobe By John Courtenay Grimwood - A Son of the Rock -- Jack Deighton
October 12, 2008 at 2:32 pm
[...] instances of “sat” instead of the more correct “sitting.” (And, sadly, there is a “span” count of 1. [...]
BSFA Short Story Competition 3 - A Son of the Rock -- Jack Deighton
May 19, 2009 at 9:22 pm
[...] sentence the neologism skool but later in the story the usual spelling appears. And there is a “span” count of three. [...]
When Time Winds Blow by Robert Holdstock – A Son of the Rock -- Jack Deighton
April 24, 2010 at 2:19 pm
[...] is a “span” count of 2 (though one instance of “spun”) plus two cases of flaunting the [...]