1.4   Sound and Form

    It is generally agreed that the written form of a natural language is the orthographical(正字法的) record of the oral form(口语形式). Naturally the written form should agree with the oral form. In other words, the sound should be consistent with(与...一致) the form. This is fairly true of English in its earliest stage, i. e. Old English. The speech of the time was represented much more faithfully(忠实地) in writing than it is today. With the development of the language, more and more differences arose between the two.

    One reason for this is that the English alphabet (字母)was adopted from the Romans, and it does not have a separate letter to represent each sound in the language so that some letters must do double duty or work together in combination.

    Another reason is that the pronunciation has changed more rapidly than spelling over the years, and in some cases the two have drawn far apart. In the last five hundred years, though the sounds of speech have changed considerably, there have been no corresponding(相应的), radical (根本的；彻底的)changes in spelling. In the early days the spelling differences did not matter very much as people were not so used to seeing words in print, and the ideal of spelling uniformity(同一；一致) had not been formulated(建立). No one was quite sure how some English words should be spelled. Sometimes, people deliberately(故意；特意) changed the spelling of words either to make a line even or for easier recognition. Before the printing press was brought to England, everything was written by hand. Those scribes(抄写员；抄写吏), who made a living by writing for other people, often worked in haste to meet the needs of the king, church, and merchants. One problem was that several letters written with short vertical strokes(垂直笔划) such as i, u , v, m, w and n looked all alike. Consequently, their handwriting caused misunderstanding. To solve the problem in part, they changed the letter u to o when it came before m , n , or v. This is how sum , cum , wuman , wander, munk came to be written as some, come, woman, wonder, monk. At some point, too, the scribes seem to have decided that no English word should end in u or v. Thus, in time, an e was added to such words as live, have, due, and true but not pronounced (Deightonl979).

    In the late 1500, printing became well established. It helped to freeze(固定) and standardize(使标准化) the spelling of words. The standardization makes spelling sacred(). Dictionaries did their share in stopping spelling changes. Meanwhile, sounds continued to change as usual, thus bringing more differences.

    Finally comes the borrowing, which is a rich source for the English vocabulary. When words were borrowed from other languages, Latin, Greek, French, etc. , both meanings and spellings were borrowed. The early borrowings were assimilated(使同化) and the later ones, however, do not conform to(与...一致) the rules of English pronunciation and spelling, e.g. stimulus (L.), denouement (F)(（戏剧、小说等的）结局，收场), fiesta (Sp)(（说西班牙语国家的）宗教节日；节日), eureka (Gr)(（因发现某物，尤指问题的答案而高兴）我发现了，我找到了), and kimono (Jap)（和服；和服式晨衣）.

The written form of English is, therefore, an imperfect representation of the phonemic (语音的)elements of the spoken language (Quirk 1978). From time to time in history, some British and American scholars have made efforts to reform the English orthography(拼写体系；拼写法), but with little success. Shaw once joked about the irregularities of English spelling, saying that fish could be spelled asghoti like this:

gh like the / in Laugh

    o like the i in women

ti like the sh in nation 

Shaw' s little joke drives home(一语中的地说明) the popular notion(普遍观念) about the spelling system that it is an unmanageable(难以掌控的), disorganized (杂乱无章的) mess. In spite of the irregularities(), at least eighty percent of our words fit consistent spelling patterns. And even those spellings that appear to be irregular may have more regularity and usefulness than we realize. In such words as hymn (赞美诗；圣歌), condemn(谴责；宣告某人有罪) , bomb, for example, the last letter of each is silent. But when these words are extended into longer ones, the silent letters become audible: hymnal, condemnation(谴责；定罪) and bombard(炮击；轰炸). This is a general rule.