I really like English language accents. That has been true ever since I found myself teaching Slovak students English literature like Beowulf or Shakespeare as part of their third, fourth, fifth, or sixth language studies. If you come from a place like Slovakia, it is not unusual to speak like eight languages.
Though I am Chicago born and bred, I defected to Slovakia after college to teach, and the many accents of the English language became fun for me to notice. I personally like to say Barcelona with a big funny lisp when no one is around. If you’ve heard a native of Barcelona say the name of his hometown, you know what I mean.
And if you say it once, you’ll probably be saying it all day. It’s kind of funny to think that’s the right way to say the name of a place.
There’s a history to the “lisp” of Spanish Spanish and how it developed by people trying to look cool, and now the lisp is just normal now. Those who know Spanish accents know the lisp, or “theta.” For reasons unknown, but theorized, the lisp did not cross the Atlantic very effectively.
My Mexican roommate in college lost his cool when my Spanish study partner said “the reason the ‘theta’ from Spain did not come to the new world was because Mexicans are descended from Spanish whores who the sailors visited and who were not cultured enough to speak with the Spanish lisp of the Spanish court.”
You could imagine a person might lose his cool over such a thing. I was never able to have those two in the same room again after that. A man is liable to get his butt kicked over saying something like that.
After it became clear that Todd and Sweet Lou could never get along, is the day that I lost all hope in ever again recovering my Spanish grade.
That’s one kind of lisp I like doing when no one is watching - the Spanish lisp. I like pretending to be theatrical in my free time. Or at least when nobody is watching. Which I guess makes me sort of a closeted thespian.
Thespian is a hard word to say without a lisp, or to at least feel like I am saying something lispy. Sometimes if I say the word thespian, I descend into full blown “flaming New York gay man” accent. Also, there was a Saturday Night Live skit called “The Ladies Man” in which the title character spoke with a lisp.
That’s got a different flare to it than the “flaming New York gay man” accent. That is Afro-american lispy accent. Once I asked a black cop I was working with how he was doing on a hot July day and pulled up with some ice cold water for him to cool off with.
His answer was “You’re in here driving around in the air conditioning and I’m out here sweating like a Hebrew slave.” It was the nineties in Chicago. You were allowed to talk like that.
In fact you still are.
Carl Sandberg wrote about Chicago
"Come and show me another city with lifted head singing so proud to be alive and coarse and strong and cunning. Flinging magnetic curses amid the toil of piling job on job, here is a tall bold slugger set vivid against the little soft cities..."
Yes, Chicago can be inappropriately coarse, but at least it ain't soft.
"...sweating like a Hebrew slave" is what that cop said when I offered him water!
It’s especially spicy because he was black and he was talking about slavery and referencing the Bible and referencing Hebrews and he said it in about as lispy of a way as one can lisp. I’m not sure if you can imagine “sweating like a Hebrew slave,” with a lisp, but it’s really funny as far as I’m concerned. It’s the only way to tell that story, because, well, that’s exactly how that cop said that phrase.
Then there is the time Cindy Brady had a lisp on The Brady Bunch. I still don’t know if she really had a lisp as an actress or if they were just trying to ham it up.
A lisp can be like a song stuck in my head.
Once I start lisping the thespian in me can have fun with it all day.
Now, if you have gotten through all that without being dragged into a lisp yet… Well, allow me to be the umpteenth person today (or who knows, maybe the first) to wish you. May the 4th be with you.
Which sounds like a lispy version of that Star Wars phrase May the Force be with you. May the Fourth be with you. It’s Star Wars Day today I think. Or some term like that.
Which is probably why that retard Luke Skywalker was talking to that retard illegitimate president and his retard press secretary yesterday. (I kept everything lispy in this writing until I got to the word retard)
Now, if you have a creative flare in your writing, it may be time to take the leap and turn it into a book. Especially if you aren’t afraid to point out politically incorrect things and shine a spotlight on them. This era needs more truth tellers who do not shy away.
In fact, this era needs all of us to be truth tellers as much as we can.
Even when it’s uncomfortable. If that’s you, I hope you go through life telling the truth. Yes, I like writers who tell the truth.
I am gathering together a crew of them.
Twice a month we’ll meet as a group (attendance optional). I’ll hold your hand through the writing and publishing process. You’ll get a book done by Christmas.
You can even bring a friend along with you for free. It won’t be as hard as you think.
It’s going to require some work, and some buckling down, but it’s not a crazy amount of work. I’ll walk you through the traditional publishing process or through the self publishing process. And a lot more. I’m not promising you the world, but you’ll have me as a trusty resource and you’ll end up better off than if you did it alone.
You have until the end of the day tomorrow to get in.
Soon we begin, so that you have your first book (or your next book) ready by Christmas. And May the Fourth be with you.
Tap here: https://realstevo.com/writer
-Allan Stevo
P.S. Substack doesn't like my links lately. If you are reading this from a Substack email, you probably have to copy and paste the link above. Either that, or you are going to have to be left out of the awesomeness that is this invitation to join me in this group.
Thethpian :) Castilian Spanish, it's a blatht.
What constantly surprises me in language-related stories is not the Europeans speaking languages but Americans by and large being monolingual. In a country with so many cultures, how did we get there?
(Hope your 4th was with you!)
very funny. but not , as I'll be lithping all day!