Hello and good morning from New York!
Okay. Before this gets more out of hand, let me be clear. I am
not promoting the idea of removing "do", I was just pointing out that,
in English, in certain circumstances, the use of 'do' is meaningless, it just adds rhythm to the sentences. It's
fun, at least for me, to think about stuff like that. It's what drew me to the question about
BUT OristarA asked to begin this thread.
As for the idea of Standard English, I am one of those English speakers who is very glad we do not all speak to each other as if we were reading the news on television.
(A speaker from the British Isle might say that sentence as "I am very glad indeed we ...." . Indeed is another one of the empathizers in English. What meaning does it add? Oh, well. enough of that.)
OristarA: My apologies to you for posting that joke. You understand it pretty well, but it's it's sillier than how you say it, maybe I can make it clearer. (That's a big maybe.)
Someone once said explaining a joke is like dissecting a frog; you understand it better, but the frog dies. So now,
I will try to explain a joke. Good luck, OristarA!! Good luck, frog!
The joke is a silly contrast between the supposed words of two
very serious philosophers, Kant and Voltaire and (this you did not know) Frank Sinatra, who was a pop music singer a few years ago. A seriously good singer, but not a serious philosophical person.
It's a play on the words DO and BE.
First, we have the very serious Philosophers supposedly saying "Be all and do" and "Do all and be" then, for the punchline, we add the not serious at all singer who at the end of one of his songs sings: "Doo be doo be doo." which are nonsense words.
So, it's:
Supposed very serious words.
Supposed very serious words.
Silly nonsense words.
Voltaire : Be all and do!
Kant: Do all and be!
Sinatra: Doo be doo be doo.
Get it? How's the frog doing?
Hey, I found the song :
http://youtu.be/rDA33hGFNgQ
Listen at 2:22 near the end.
See? He's just making up words to finish the song.
Another try:
It's as if you had two of your best poets come out on a stage.
Each one reads one of their most beautiful verses.
Everyone is quiet, thinking.
Then out onto the stage comes another man.
He walks to the microphone.
Waits just a moment.
Then
he makes a sound like a duck quacking, a baby crying and a car horn.
(I don't know. Would Chinese people think that was funny??)
It is always a pleasure for me to read your writing, OristarA, and to try to answer your questions.
Joe(I promise. No more jokes!)Nation
