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Re: word usage (was Re: aw_world_object_password SDK call?) (General Discussion)
Re: word usage (was Re: aw_world_object_password SDK call?) // General Discussion
Aug 11, 2002, 7:17am
Current usage dictates "worser" to be incorrect--PERIOD. Get out of the 16th and 17th centuries, and don't expect some 12-year-old interview to support your argument. Take a basic English grammar class and get a clue.
[View Quote]
[View Quote]> eep wrote:
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> This double comparative has a long literary history beginning in the late 15c.: e.g. Chang'd to a worser shape thou canst not be-Shakespeare,
> 1591; I find she is A diuell, worser then the worst in hell-J. Ford, 1633; For I, e'en I, the bondsman of a worser man was made-W. Morris, 1887;
> Some gals is better, some wusser than some-E. Pound, 1959; The people oh Lord Are sinful and sad Prenatally biassed Grow worser born bad-Stevie
> Smith, 1975.
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> The Oxford English Dictionary's verdict (1928) on the status of the word is still about right: 'The word was common in the 16th and 17th c. as a
> variant of 'worse', in all its applications. In modern use, it is partly a literary survival (especially in phrases like the worser part, sort,
> half), partly dial. and vulgar.' Its vulgar use is illustrated by the following examples: Your poor dear wife as you uses worser nor a dog-Dickens,
> 1835; That's my new word. Yeah, it's gonna be worser. You know, worse to worser-Interview (US), 1990.
>
> Can we be any more pedant?
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