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From: Jerry Friedman <jerry_fried...@yahoo.com>
Newsgroups: alt.usage.english
Subject: Re: Ravel / unravel: Ozzies wrong, Yankees right...
Date: Tue, 15 May 2012 10:23:47 -0700 (PDT)
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On May 15, 11:08=A0am, R H Draney <dadoc...@spamcop.net> wrote:
> Cheryl filted:
>
>
>
> >On 2012-05-15 10:32 AM, annily wrote:
> >> On 15.05.12 19:31, fabzorba wrote:
>
> >>> Which form of ravel / unravel do YOU use in your NOTW?
>
> >> I didn't know that Americans still use "ravel" in the Shakespearean
> >> sense. I've always used "unravel".
>
> >I would speak of a ravelled sleeve, or say a particular fabric ravels
> >easily. The 'a' is pronounced kind of oddly, almost like 'revel'.
>
> >However, a local friend I just asked always uses 'unravelled'.
>
> I use "ravel" in the Shakespearean sense, but that's because I used to pr=
ogram
> in APL....r

You need to get into COCA.

unravel: 1200
ravel: 271

I glanced through about 100 hits on "ravel", and all the ones I
noticed were about some French composer, except a typo for "travel"
and the following gem (in which I assume "dunking" should be
"thinking"):

"He had indulged these thoughts dunking they did not matter, thinking
the nature of marriage was *to unravel only to ravel again* with the
right reconstituting gesture or word. He had not imagined his wife -
she with the shining, sentimental gaze - capable of raising the
subject of divorce."

Emphasis added.

Rachel Kadish, "Love Story", /The New England Review/, 2007.

To get rid of Maurice, I tried

raveled: 33 (including 6 Shakespeare quotations)
ravelled: 2 (one from Shakespeare)

unraveled: 304
unravelled: 41

I think it's safe to say that when not quoting Shakespeare, the great
majority of Americans say "unravel".

--
Jerry Friedman