The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1922-10-05
ON SECOND THOUGHT
BY JAY =. HOUSE.
(From Philadelphia Public Ledgar.l

I
bearing upon the yernacular OF the
| esteemed Pennsylvania Dutch Scum-
bers the desk. We seem to have
tapped an inexhaustible stream of
to dispose Of them in the fragment
tary fashion hitherto followed. In
stead we are going to have a Pennsyl-
vania Dutch Day, on which we shall
print so much of the material as may
be compressed within column OF
space.
The date of the celebration has not
vet been fixed. All we can say is that
the matter will appear when, for the
reason that we have been invited out
OF town-to pay golf or engage in
,wassail and song, we are unable to
freach the jolly old desk for the pur-
pose of performing our accustomed
toll.
We will say. however, that to one
who peruses the literature of 1922
There is nothing inexplicable about
1.-The patois of the Pennsylvania Dutch.
Compared to much of the current
writing it is ineligible and apt We
have in mind. at the moment, Gar
lgoyles," recent novel by Ben Hecht
We haven't read "Gargoyles." Per-
haps we shall not read it. We fancy
it would be a dreary waste of time
to do SO. But we find in Haywood
Broun's column the excerpt from the
book which we shall set down-in a
succeeding paragraph.
DO you know what? Do you
know? Its all humpty- dumpty.
Egg-heads falling off a wall and
smashing. But 1 know what I got
your number. Wait There
was something to say. Why? Damn
1T not that way. Hit poor
sad ones on the head. Better the dirty
swine in the city hall. Aw, huh! What
for? Wrong. Something else. They
, were like him. Brothers, everybody.
The publishers say Mr.. Hecht's book
is written in Straightforward. man to
man, between you and me. plain
English" We say it isn't plain Eng
, lish, or anything else. There is nc
such vernacular anywhere within the
range of the English-speaKing tongue
There isn't a consciousness in this
, world to which it would convey an in.
, telligible thought. \ Compared to it
Pennsylvania Dutch is limpid stream
| of pure and undefiled English.
That ought to settle Mr.. Hecht's
hash. but he is pretty strong with the
New York Mutual Admiration society
and may survive the castigation.
Thanks, Awfully.
-"Reincarnation'1i absolutei,
/. not the word for the successive phases
of that Protean story or yours which
after twenty-five years of beaconing
/, yet remains among the nebulae.
Il 1t might pass to speak figuratively
: Of a story's "incarnation''-tto only {
; high-falutin addict would do so. Tha
would mean - again figuratively
; speaking-that the story had received
full investiture in the flesh and BLOOD
, OF literary expression. VI
Now, inasmuch as, by your owl
: confession, your corking tale in any
, of it's projections has never once had
; an incarnation, how can it ever have
had so much as a single reincarna-
ton, much less five<or six?
Il Your dictionary is too far from
your elbow or else that. part of your
anatomy sadly needs grease How
often do you have to be told thai
your locutions are decentered?
1 know it does the public no good
to correct you. But you are a con-
venient subject for a student of the
art of writing to practice on. Hence
the heavy mail-or mailed fist-that
lands on the lid o. the jumping jack
column. WILL TELL.
We should be more interested in
? Mr.. Tells revelation If we could de-
eide what difference it makes. Il
seems to US the acid test of a writ.
ing-man is whether he can hold g
job. We had one up to the time OF
our most recent appearance at the
cashiers window. Mr.. Tell, it ap.
pears, is merely planning to secure
one.
There is much slipshod writing
: Doubtless we do our share of it.
Roughly speaking, we have, in the
twenty-five years last past, written a
million words for publication. Vir-
tualiy every line of it has beer
printed. 1t would be surprising II
that gross output were unlocked by
error. Nor does the thought disturb
us. Billy Sunday was one grand
outfielder but he couldn't hit.
Before the war there were no American