Just some babbling from yours truly about the idea of beautiful words. What makes a word beautiful? Can it sound beautiful without the sound being connected to it’s meaning? Why does this list of the 100 most Beautiful Words in th English Language include so many words of imported (French, Italian etc..) origin?
Also interesting – list of favorite English words of non-english speakers, turns up much more homespun vocabulary. “Twinkle” – yeah! How did that not make the other list? It’s awesome!
Finally, as promised, the clip from Eddie Izzard that made me love the word “ciao” – this one goes out to all my Italian friends (and Eddie’s right! They’re just like that!)
Advertisements
February 1, 2009 at 12:58 pm
It keeps stopping when it gets to the point :o(
February 1, 2009 at 5:13 pm
Yeah the video seems poofed. It might need a re-upload? I liked the first part though, looking forward to hearing the rest.
February 2, 2009 at 2:48 pm
My faves
Antimony
Undulation
Zilch
Eucalyptus
Keester
Fuck
and anything ending in “ology”
February 3, 2009 at 8:17 am
“In the beginning, there was the word, and the word was hydrogen.”
The vid was working (for me) yesterday. Don’t know what the fuss was about.
But anyway, yes, what makes a word beautiful? Is it the memory it conjures, the meaning it intends, the curvaceous juxtaposition of letters, the shape of sound in one’s mouth or ears? Is it the space between symbols, the silence between words, that carves out the jubilant gorgeousness of language?
A Finnish friend once, searching for the proper English translation of facial tissue, settled on “noseblower” — an endearing, if not entirely elegant, choice. A Kenyan friend, uttering “please” in his native tongue, would cause a fellow female companion to purr — whereas on American lips, the same word was powerless. Simpering, a Persian friend says ‘uxorious‘ is one of her favorite words…
Go figure.
February 3, 2009 at 5:09 pm
Just discovered your blog, love it! Fantastic discovering Madrid from a guiri’s point of view. 🙂
Some of my favourite words are the Finnish short ones, like järvi (lake) or joki (river), they sound mythic.
Sorry for my English
February 3, 2009 at 8:35 pm
I had a friend growing up who’s Finnish , I can remember only vaguely a couple words: the ones for mother (aiti?)and for beer – and I always thought they sounded cool – especially for beer – oluta (sp?). Basically the language in general sounded cool.
February 3, 2009 at 11:03 pm
UALLERA!!!
the best explanation ever!!!!
You took easily the real deep meaning.
it’s difficult to understand even for a lot of Italians! ..maybe it’s because you feel it!
uallera is inside all of you…you just needed to named it! (be friend with your uallera)
ciao
February 4, 2009 at 6:12 pm
For italian is:
bambino. (all the words ending in ino).
Spanish is special because I know it now but at firt it was:
centro
postre
all the sounds in tr.
February 5, 2009 at 5:52 pm
In Swedish, definitely “fuffens”, meaning mischief or shenanigans! Maybe cuz I am a bit sneaky sometimes and likes to pull a prank or two on unsuspecting people 🙂
In English, I am still weak for “purty”, but you have to elongate the u of course to make it sound perfect
February 12, 2009 at 11:23 pm
I’ve always been a big fan of the words:
exaggerate
radical
ubiquitous
free
March 6, 2010 at 7:23 pm
I have to write an essay for school about what I think is THE most beautiful word. I think I’ve found my pick. My favorite word is “lingerie”. It rolls off the tongue, and has multiple pronunciations which are all beautiful. It is derived from the french language, so it is obviously malliflous. In English it also sounds sexy and makes people feel great just by saying it.
What do you think?