#etienne ze amvela

[cherryblossomshadow]

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I value the fact that English has two parallel vocabularies - the Germanic vocabulary and the Latinate vocabulary. For example, we have the word undersa, and then we have submarine. Or underground and subterranean, all-powerful and omnipotent. So we can shift registers. We can say something in a very plain, blunt, Anglo-Saxon way, like "I will not do that" - all Anglo-Saxon monosyllables. Or we can say it in a fancier, more distance, abstract, Latinate way, like "I prefer not to permit myself to approach such a notion." Or, in a passage of plain Anglo-Saxon, you can throw in one Latinate word, unexpected, to great effect.

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lydia davis