A Man of His (Corrected) Words

Thank you for the generous review of my book, A Man of My Words (St. Martin’s Press, 2003), by Richard Wertime ’64. In the interest of accuracy, I dispute Professor Wertime’s contention that “Lederer errs, I believe, in citing unionized (the presence of labor unions) and unionized (not ionized) as the longest heteronyms in English — two words spelled the same way but pronounced differently. Surely, he has overlooked consummate (the verb, to ‘fulfill,’ ‘to bring to fruition’) and consummate (the adjective rightly pronounced ‘con-SUM-it’ meaning ‘masterful,’ ‘outstanding’) — one letter longer than the nine-lettered unionized.”

True heteronymic pairs are etymologically unrelated — entrance (entryway) and entrance (to fascinate) and moped (fretted) and moped (the vehicle). That’s what makes heteronyms so delightful and surprising. The verb consummate derives directly from the adjective consummate, as, for another example, does the ten-lettered verb attributes from the noun attributes. If one admits etymologically bound pairs to the heteronymic company — primer/primer, convict/convict, and the like — the category is muddied and ruined. I stand by my claim that the two manifestations of unionized constitute the longest heteronymic pair in our language.

Richard Lederer '59
San Diego

All-Nighters Revisited

David Langlieb ’05 (“In Defense of the All-Nighter,” Moved to Speak, Fall 2004) gives too much credit to the acumen of his professors. I can only explain this by a short recitation of my experience in my major while at Haverford (not to embarrass either the major or the professor, they shall go nameless). In a discussion of the effect that stress or whatever increases one’s adrenalin flow, I maintained this can act to sharpen one’s senses and enable one to produce at a level far above their otherwise normal performance. The professor categorically stated that was not the case and used the grades on papers as his proof positive. Namely, all-nighters would/could only get C’s to C+’s and it takes reviewing your work more than once to get B’s or above.

The tragedy of youth and its inherent lack of judiciousness overtook my better instincts and I retorted that I was an inveterate all-nighter and was getting B+’s from him. Needless to say, my final grade was C+, the lowest of my senior year! (For reference, I was elected to the Founders Club despite that grade pulling down my average.)

Vincent S. Averna ’56
McLean, Va.