Monday Miscellany: Some Odds, Ends and Personals

____________________

Byter Martin S sent me an email in respect of my quoting some rhymes about God:

Re: Pedantry

I believe the quote is to be written as follows…..

How odd of God/To choose the Jews

But certainly, from what I know, not as you have written it.

Martin has taken me to task before and has been correct.

I had written the above couplet as :

How odd

Of God

To choose 

The Jews

rather than as suggested by Martin:

How odd of God

To choose the Jews

In my defence I plead that I had seen the couplet, and some of the other ones quoted, written in both formats but I stayed with the 4 line version in that that is how they were quoted in the Oxford Dictionary of Humorous Quotations. 

Having looked at it again, particularly at how the lines scan when read or spoken, I confess to preferring Martin’s version.

____________________

Martin headed his email to me “Pedantry”.

Pedantry is:

I believe that Martin’s comments are valid and not pedantry.

Thanks, Martin.

____________________

Here are the couplets again, in the revised format:

How odd Of God
To choose The Jews.
- William Ewer (1885–1976) 

Not odd of God,
Goyim annoy ‘im.
- Leo Rosten 

But not so odd as those who choose
A Jewish God, yet spurn the Jews.
- Cecil Brown or Ogden Nash 

Not odd of God,
His son was one. 

Not so odd,
The Jews chose God. 

Not odd, you sod,
The Jews chose God. 

How strange of man
To change the plan.

____________________

The word "pedant" comes from the French pédant or its older mid-15th century Italian source pedante, "teacher, schoolmaster". The origin of the Italian pedante is uncertain but several dictionaries suggest that it was contracted from the medieval Latin pædagogans, "to act as pedagogue, to teach". The Latin word is derived from a Greek word which means "child" and "to lead", which originally referred to a slave who escorted children to and from school but later meant "a source of instruction or guidance"

____________________

"The pedant is he who finds it impossible to read criticism of himself without immediately reaching for his pen and replying to the effect that the accusation is a gross insult to his person. He is, in effect, a man unable to laugh at himself."

- Sigmund Freud

____________________

From son Thomas: