Contents
-SUBJECT INDEX -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD
H.L. Mencken (1880–1956). The American Language. 1921.
Page 192
to census, 60 to wassermann, to major (i. e., to make this or that subject a major study in college),
to debut, to author, to press-agent, to sacrilege, to house-clean, to reunion, 61 to headquarters, to pendulum, to janitor, 62 and
to vacation. Many such verbs are in the vocabularies of the arts and crafts. American librarians say that a new book has been
accessioned, trained nurses speak of
specialing, firemen use
siamesed hoses, uplifters report that they have
contacted with cases,
63 dealers in kitchen appliances promise
to service them (
i. e., to keep them in repair for a definite time), and the managers of a well-known chain of hotels advertise that they are
Statler-operated. The theatrical magazine,
Variety, always brilliant with novel Americanisms, uses many such verbs,
e. g., to lobby-display (
i. e., to display photographs of a performer in a theatre lobby). A great boldness shows itself in the making of these new verbs.
To demote, when it came in during the war, was scarcely challenged.
To renig, a few years before, had been fashioned, as a matter of course, from
renegade by back-formation.
To knock, to rattle, to roast and
to pan, when they appeared, were accepted without question as quite regular. I have found
to s o s, in the form of its gerund.
64To loan, still under the ban in England, has been long in very respectable use in the United States. I have observed its employment by a vice-president of the National City Bank of New York,
65 by the dramatic critic of the
Nation, 66 and by the secretary of the Poetry Society of America.
67 Where a verb differs etymologically from its corresponding noun or is otherwise felt to be clumsy or pedantic, the tendency seems to be to dispose of the difference by manufacturing a new verb. Examples are afforded by
to injunct, to steam-roller and
to operate (transitive).
To injunct, I note, has begun to crowd out
to enjoin; it is obviously more in harmony