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OP Many years ago there was a program on NPR (national public radio) called "A Word in Your Ear".
in one "episode" John Ciardi coined a word he called "klmnop" he pronounced it kelaminopee. He had a long story about what it was to mean etc... It made a deep impression on me!
Does anyone have any additional information on this word? Since Ciardi died in 1986 i doubt the
folks at NPR have posted real audio files of his programs on the web yet... but i really enjoyed that
NPR program ( "A Word in Your Ear")!! Anyone else recall this radio program?
Comments?!
I remember that show. I always enjoyed listening to John. Have you tried contacting NPR?--perhaps they can even lead you to a sound file or a transcript of it.
Was this word/definition intended to be funny? Just curious, never had the pleasure of listening to the show. The only other incidence I can recall of giving a pronunciation to a string of letters in the alphabet was an old Sesame Street show, and Big Bird sang all 26 as one word.
OP A search of www.npr.org for the word "Ciardi" turns up a few hits, they are rerunning some old shows. One place where they are re-running them is _Morning Edition_. I emailed that program and all i got back was a mail-bot general reply. I guess i am not serious enough about this to do more....
OP Jackie asked:
[snip]
Was this word/definition intended to be funny?
[snip]
Perhaps in Ciardi's sense of humor--yes. It was so long ago that i barely recall how he defined "klmnop"...
He pronounced it kelamenopee and said something about it being in the middle between somthing (like the letters do in the alphabet). I recall he had a lot of other parts to the use/definition and of all the Ciardi programs i listend to this is the only one that i can still remember well after 20+ years!!
This rather reminds me of a famous crossword clue H,I,J,K,L,M,N,O (5)
Water?
Correct.
All right, you have GOT to tell me how that answer is derived from that clue! Impressive, lusy!
Well, yer see, it's like this:
H,I,J,K,L,M,N,O is "H to O", which leads to "H2O", which is "water", (5 letters).
The "2" should of course be subscript, but markup doesn't let me do this.
I think there is possibly a joke there too. It relates to a previous conversation about euphemism. The next letter should be "P" so the person answering the question hastily replaces it with .. "er ... water"
Thanks! DUH!
All this brings to mind the famous Christmas card message:
ABCDEFGHIJKMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
Cheers
Paul Bywater
Paul--
What the 'L'??
Jackie (and friends): I'm happy to share the Christmas card message with you publicly -- but Christmas is months away!
If you just can't wait, send me a personal email.
Cheers
Paul Bywater
>If you just can't wait, send me a personal email.
'el, No.
It's all Greek to me. ;-)
Well, the first and last letters, anyway. Can this be the key?
Just read tsuwm's reply, belatedly and anastrophically. Very good. As usual.
That wasn't the first el no was it?
Jo, no, I believe the first el (ni)ņo was sighted off-shore Peru, in 1982.
hope this helps, *EG*
Man I ain't believin' this! Maht as way-ull put up
mah "Private swimmin' ool" sign.
Ciardi's "A Browser's Dictionary" (New York: Harper & Row: 1980) has this entry:
kelemenopy (Accent on penultimate.) The one essential trope neglected by classical rhetoricians: a sequential straight line through the middle of everything, leading nowhere. "Teddy Kennedy's career has been the classical kelemenopy of the American twentieth century." - Angelo Registratore. ... /Kelemenopy/ is from my own psychic warp, to see if anyone would notice, and because I have always dreamed of fathering a word....
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