In one of his essays Jeremy Bernstein expresses surprise at someone pronouncing WH Auden’s first name: somehow ‘Wystan’ became ‘Whistan’ – like whisk.
This puzzles me in turn. Is it an over aspirated ‘h’ sound which was unexpected, or did Bernstein think the name should be pronounced like Whystan? Just goes to show the perils of attempting phonetic spellings for those who do not share your pronunciation conventions, & how small differences can cause much confusion.
I was a sixteen year old au pair girl in Brussels. Madame’s brother was in the process of renovating a beautiful house on the outskirts of the city, reputed to have once been a hunting lodge of Charles V.
One Sunday the whole family, me included, drove out to inspect the work in progress.
The owner was particularly proud to show me one room – 'You will really like this one,' he said.
And I did indeed. I suppose you could call it a garden room, long & quite narrow with three pairs of windows down each of the long sides.
‘You like thees, it’s ver’ Eenglish?’ asked monsieur. ‘Two door, two door.’
Yes, I said dubiously. The doors were indeed double doors, even though there were more than two of them. And although each was topped by a pointed stone arch, rather than a horizontal frame, I would have called them French windows. So what was meant to be so English about them?
I am ashamed to say how many years passed by before this story suddenly popped into my head one day & I realised far too late that I had been invited to admire a fine example of Tudor architecture.
