Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0023301, Mon, 3 Sep 2012 22:59:13 -0300

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Re: Ardis tap water
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Re: [NABOKV-L] Ardis tap waterStan Kelly-Bootle:Thanks, Alexey, for the fascinating word-plays/links. Also for quoting some fine-flowing Nabokovian discourses, with hallmark rarities (Webster III?) tickling my Brit ears:utile = archaic: advantageous... A usage worthy of comment: the driver says of the road “It abuts at the forest.” Pedants would normally say (transitively!) “It abuts the forest,” since the “at” is already embedded in the prefix “a-” (via Latin “ad”) of “a-but.” Since “it abuts” is uncommonly posh (compared with “it borders”), one is left wondering why the driver’s grammar is rather peccably colloquial?

Jansy Mello: Couldn't "utile" be some sort of gallicisme?
The wiktionary, on "abut," also suggests a subreptitious French influence :"...From Middle English abutten, from Old French abouter, aboter (“to border on”); compare French aboutir, and also abuter; a (Latin ad) + Old French boter, buter (“to push”). Compare French bout (“end”), and but (“end, purpose”)." Perhaps, like Homais, a driver also nods.

btw: Irony...The incorrectly named Brittany (from McEwan's Atonement) is called Briony.


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