The Emancipated

Начало книги

Johnny Black said: "Fo-wer sco-wer and-a sev-un yee-yers ago-wa, ou-wer fah-vers... fah-zerf—"

"The word" said Dr. Ewing, "is 'fathers'. With the voiced dental fricative, like this." The good psychologist made a horrible face as he intoned the "th" of "father," so Johnny could see how his tongue was used. Johnny recoiled a little before he remembered that his instructor had no intention of biting him.

"How?" he asked politely.

Dr. Ewing repeated the consonant whereon so many foreign students of English have come to grief. But the foreigners at least had human dentition, with four large chisel-shaped upper incisors flanked by a pair of chisel-shaped canines. Johnny's upper incisors were six small pegs, and the canines were large conical tusks. No matter what he did with his organs of speech, the resulting sound resembled anything but a human "th" sound.

He had numerous other troubles. For instance, the l's defeated him completely. So Johnny at his best sounded like a Voder with a short circuit. But it was doing pretty well, considering that he had not in his youth established those many chains of lightning reflexes that enable men to rattle off threats, promises, excuses and lies so glibly. And that his black bear's anatomy had not been designed for speech in the first place. A man learning to type with his toes would be a good analogue to Johnny learning to talk.

Читать дальше →