Article: "Parlez-vous Slurvian—or Silurian?"

[Mervin Block]

Dear Friend,

       Don’t confuse Slurvian with Silurian. Slurvian is slurred English. Jeetjet, for example, is Slurvian quickspeak for “Did you eat yet?” As the columnist William Safire asked, Yagoddaprollemwiddat? If not, fuhgeddaboudit.

       Silurians are a fictional race of reptile-like humanoids. They star in a sci-fi TV series on BBC. The Silurian geologic period occurred 440 million years ago, give or take.

       The oldest living Silurian in this country, George Bookman, is only 98 years old. The Society of Silurians in New York City is an organization of newspaper, magazine and broadcast reporters and editors, most of them retired. As the Society seems to define the word, a Silurian is someone who dates from that geologic period. Once upon a time, Bookman worked for Time, Fortune, U.S. News and the Washington Post—one at a time.

       All this is by way of introducing an unusual interview—by me, of me and for me. The interview ran recently in the Silurians’ newspaper. And you can read it on page 3 of this link (in PDF format).

  If you have any questions, suggestions, corrections, objections or observations, you can reach me at mer...@aol.com.                        

Mervin Block                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 Television Newswriting Workshop                                                                                                                                                                                                    http://www.mervinblock.com