The Hindu Business Line : Most things you think are right are wrong

Andrea Barham is `painfully aware' that she can't correct `the bigger issues such as war, poverty and global warming.' Therefore, she focuses on `common misconceptions' and tells you `why most things you think are right are wrong' in The Pedant's Revolt, from Mochael O'Mara Books (www.mombooks.com).

"Truth is sometimes corrupted; conjecture can become mistaken for fact; nonsense somehow becomes enshrined in the annals of our collective wisdom," bemoans Barham in the foreword. "Things get repeated not because they are based upon truth, but because they sound good."

Pedant is "a person who is excessively concerned with minor details and rules, or with displaying academic learning," explains the back cover. "It's right to be pedantic when the truth itself is at stake," insists the author. Therefore, "Next time you are tempted to pass on received wisdom, consider where it's come from and just how wise it is. If it's from a commercial for breakfast cereal, think again."

A chapter on William Shakespeare begins with the popular quote from Hamlet, `Brevity is the soul of wit.' Barham points out how this line is mistakenly understood to mean, `Don't take too long to tell a joke.' Turn to Act II, Scene 2 of the play, where you find Lord Polonius telling Hamlet's mother: "Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit, and tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes, I will be brief: your noble son is mad."

Barham asks, "But where's the joke?" In Shakespeare's time, wit meant wisdom, so his line meant, `a wise speaker does not require long-winded explanations.' Similarly, `discretion is the better part of valour,' traced from Henry IV has the words differently arranged: "The better part of valour is discretion."

A quote from Book VI of The Confessions of Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1736) reads thus: "I recollected the thoughtless saying of a great princess, who, on being informed that the country people had no bread, replied, `Then let them eat pastry!'" Who was that princess? "Rousseau did not mention Marie Antoinette by name. This may have been because, in 1736, Marie Antoinette was minus 19 years old, which rather rules her out as the originator of the phrase," writes Barham.

You believe, "Sherlock Holmes said, `Elementary, my dear Watson?" It seems the line doesn't appear in any of the Holmes chronicles written by Arthur Conan Doyle. "In fact Holmes only ever said, `Elementary'," notes Barham. The phrase is said to originate from a film review dated October 19, 1929 in New York Times.

Again, the `deerstalker hat' he is portrayed as doesn't find mention in the novels, informs the author. "The headgear was added by the illustrator Sidney Paget, when producing drawings for the Strand Magazine."

What does SOS stand for? Save our souls, or save our ship? "The first distress call used by the Marconi Company was C.Q.D. The letters did indeed stand for something: C.Q. was a shortened expression of `seek you', and D stood for danger or distress," explains the book. "In 1908, the letters SOS were chosen simply because the Morse code for them (three dots, three dashes, three dots) was easy to remember and transmit." Thus, SOS isn't an acronym; "it is simply a sequence of three letters which are easy to transmit in Morse."

A book for the truth-seekers!

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