John Steinbeck – Voice of America

Kay T kindly contacted me the other day to let me know that the Melvyn Bragg show about John Steinbeck has been put onto You Tube. If you’re interested in Steinbeck but didn’t manage to see the programme you should be able to view it now. I really enjoyed it, I hope you do too.

6 thoughts on “John Steinbeck – Voice of America

  1. Interested in Merlin Schantz’s pronunciation of what we would call drout! He says drouth (drowth). And what is our Scots word for thirst? – drouth – (drooth) It never occurred to me before that there might be a connection!

    • Evee,
      Yes, I noticed that, I suppose that quite a lot of Scots went to the US so there’s bound to be some words which have survived in a slightly different form. Quite a lot of Scots words are similar to English words pronounced a bit differently. There’s a pub, I think it’s in Stirling, called The Drouthie Neebours – a really good pub name I think, almost as nice as The Silver Tassie.

      • Yes, nice words. Scots has some wonderful vocabulary. Another word that apparently went from Scotland to the US was pollywag! I’ve never heard it in use over here but I found out from an American friend that they use pollywog for a tadpole, and looking it up in a Scots dictionary I found it was indeed Scots! Pollywogs and puddocks – and now I call frogspawn pollywogs pending!

        • Evee,
          Pollywogs is a great word, I hadn’t heard it before although I have heard tadpoles called something else – I can’t remember what though! It’ll come to me sometime.

  2. In the Appalachians a softer version of a Scot’s brogue used to be quite common. Dad always said ‘Oot and aboot the hoose. Of course, he was 50% MacLachlan…

    • Pearl,
      It’s amazing how long language continues down generations, I imagine it must have been a long time since people settled in the Appalachians from Scotland. Somehow it seems really lovely that your Dad said ‘oot and aboot’. Do you know when the MacLachlans left Scotland?

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