djmdavies (06/16/82)
This may be of interest in relation to the discussions of literary
quality in submissions to the net. It is reproduced without any
relevant permissions whatsoever from The Listener, published by the
BBC (1982, June 10; page 17).
... From BBC External Services... "English by Radio"
"Philip Howard, the literary editor of The Times, talked to Deborah Catesby
on 'Face to Face', one of the BBC's programmes for foreign students of
English. 'Many people see him as one of the guardians of pure English,'
the eager learners were told. But he admitted problems in that sphere
on The Times: "One of the things that's happened is that spelling is a
lot worse. The legend has it that in the old days anyone who could
see a misprint or a misspelling in The Times was given a shilling.
It was never true, actually--there were always misprints in The Times.
But it would be extremely expensive to do that today--and sub-editors
and copy-takers don't really see that it matters terribly.
To be truthful, I don't think it does matter that terribly.
The important thing about English is to make your meaning clear.
A minor misspelling doesn't really muddy the meaning. It upsets
people a bit; but the reason for spelling properly is that not to
spell properly is a form of rudeness. It's like not doing your hair
before meeting someone important, or wearing dirty clothes."