Review of So You Think You Can Spell?

David Grambs and Ellen Levine have, in this 250-page volume, given us the among the best books I have seen to test, and expose the gaps in, our spelling knowledge. The variety and number of tests, extent of words selected (more than 2000), and difficulty yet importance of many of the words make this book head-and-shoulders above other spelling resources. To use the book aright, you should take the tests, make lists of the words you missed or the ones you got right but would like to know more about, and then focus on each of them until you have so burnished your vocabulary that you truly become an impressive speller and wordsmith.

A paragraph illustrating the quality of words selected, as well as testing methods, is in order. One test probes knowledge of difference in meaning between similar words, such as valence/valance, discreet/discrete, imminent/immanent, censer/censor, capitol/capital, millinery/millenary, etc. Several quizzes give you the phonetic spelling, with definitions, and then ask you to come up with the dictionary spelling. Multiple choice tests give you three or four spellings of a word, asking you to circle the correct spelling. Sometimes, however, several spellings are given, each of which is wrong, and the point of the test is to see if you can come up with the right spelling. Although you will never use some of the words, such as "xyst"--an ancient covered portico or promenade (the OED has it as "xystus") or "banns"--a public, usually church announcement of an imminent marriage, even those are important to know for historical reasons. Thus, on every page we have evidence of careful selection of words.

The book is also useful to develop adult spelling bees and to provide a method regarding how to structure tests so that the idea of spelling isn't reduced to the numbing mastery of lists of words. So You Think You Can Spell? also has promise because it explores rather unusual tests, such as a difficult-to-spell place from each of the 50 states, or a series of tests on whether a word should end in "able" or "ible," "er" or "or" and "ence" or "ance." Less useful for me, though possibly useful for others, were tests assessing whether a series of letters, such as place mat or night soil, consitutes one or two words. Especially daunting and helpful were tests where words had same-sounding syllables, but these syllables were spelled differently: such as the "ul" sound in "offal," "fo'c'sle," "wassail," and "treadle." Careful attention to these tests will make one more sure-footed in the grasp of the English language (or maybe that should be sure-handed!). I recommend the book without reservation.

Mistakes--and Other Comments

There are about 15 errors in the book, which I will go over presently. In addition, I felt that their emphasis on the perspective that spelling is an exact science and fixed in stone was both historically naive and belied by the experience one might have of studying various dictionaries. They say: "This is spelling, and its demands are absolute. The letter of the law is the law of the letters, only the exact ones," p. 9. All one need do, however, is to read an entry from the OED on a word, and you will see that many words have experienced ten or more spellings in their lifetime. Who is to say that the iteration we now have is the final one? Indeed, many words are disputed even at present. How, for example, do you spell the word for the professor who guides your course selection in college? Is s/he your academic advisor or adviser? At most colleges it is the latter, but Purdue University has consciously adopted the former as its correct spelling.

Many words will have more than one acceptable spelling in one dictionary, with only one spelling in another. For example, the OED considers bathyscaphe or bathyscaph to be acceptable current spellings, while Webster's 3d International only lists bathyscaphe. If one were in a spelling bee, then, it would be essential to know which dictionary is being used. That is something that Grambs and Levine never tell us--and never give us the sense that spelling is not an exact science even among English-language lexicographers.

They make many mistakes in their answer key, mistakes that should be pointed out. In fact, I am unusually grateful for their mistakes since it makes me want to make sure that they, in fact, are wrong and why another answer is right. It even crossed my mind that they had deliberately laced the book with errors just to give the more alert something else to notice, but I think Grambs and Levine are perfectionist-enough sorts not to have done that.

The next essay focuses on mistakes and some comments I made about words.

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