Word Harmony

My husband is American - born and bred – and he loves his country. But, he doesn’t love our language. There are simply too many spelling variations. English, the American version especially, is a montage of many voices, harmonizing Latin, French, Italian, German, Spanish, and many others, in a multicultural symphony of the nationalities that form this nation.

The beauty of this unique language, though, often creates editing cacophony. Let me borrow Terry Whalin’s example from his Book Proposals that Sell. Compare these two syntactically correct sentences:
The read book was red.
The red book was read.

Both sentences make sense, but each has a different meaning. Which does the author intend? Most word processing programs contain a spellchecking device. Don’t rely on it! Sure, it may catch some errors, but it does not know what the author has in mind.

Audio perceptions are more sensitive than visual – the ear hears what the eye overlooks. My fingers sometimes tend to be dyslexic when I type. So, occasionally, I may spell a word correctly, but not the word I meant to type. The spellchecker misses it, because it is technically not an error. Only when I read my piece aloud will I catch the mistake. Always be sure to read your work orally before making final edits and listen for a sweet melody.