Fissures of speech

Topological Alphabet Chart from Jill Britton

(T)he addition or deletion of a single letter reroutes semantics. -Richard Kostelanetz

Like in Richard Kostelanetz's list of words in "One-Letter Changes,"  the effect of letter substitutions in another work called "Reroutings" complicates the sameness and differences that hold language together.

ITCH PITCH KIT KITE LACK BLACK LACK FLACK LAG SLAG LAIN SLAIN

LAME BLAME LAMP CLAMP LONG ALONG LAP CLAP LAP SLAP LAST BLAST LAW

CLAW LEA FLEA LEEK SLEEK LICK CLICK LIE LIEN LIGHT BLIGHT LIMB

CLIMB LIVE OLIVE LOB LOBE LOCK BLOCK LOCK CLOCK LOG CLOG LOG LOGE

Again, the graphic (and sonic) mechanism by which this mutation is made possible takes precedence over concerns with external meanings. In the end, we are left with the play of forms where word responds to word alone. Indeed, when letters or words change or are missing, everything changes. That is, not just what they refer to or what they mean. What also changes is our relationship to what separates word from another word, to an identity or a difference that we now see as superficial, precarious, or even whimsical.

Letter (and sound) changes can be a source of a lot of humor, like in many puns, literary or not. (The word  "changes" itself in the title "One-Letter Changes" can either be a noun or a verb.) But just like in many humorous events, the source of laughter is a perceived breakdown in some kind of governing order. In the case of puns where one word morphs into another, what is threatened is the unstable grill of differences required to maintain the order of meaning. The mastery of the graphic and phonic gap between letters and sounds that depends upon many years of linguistic socialization is suddenly shaken, and the instant reaction can either be laughter or anger. In other cases, it can simply lead to confusion and misunderstanding. In brief, we get species of either comedy or tragedy depending on the outcome.

In "Reroutings," the core lexeme or syllable representing the invariant of the process is progressively modified by substitutions or additions of letters on the left, middle, and the right, rendering the designation of an "invariant" core superfluous. First, any core element becomes a part of a different word or context; second, this core item also slowly mutates as if in response to its changing contexts. For example, in the sequential lines,

ONE NONE ONE CONE SCONE ONE ZONE OZONE OR FOR FORE OR ORE MORE ORE

PORE SPORE ORE WORE SWORE OTHER MOTHER SMOTHER OUR SOUR SCOUR OUT

BOUT ABOUT OUT LOUT CLOUT OUT POUT SPOUT OUT ROUT ROUTE OVER LOVER

CLOVER OW LOW BLOW OW NOW SNOW OWN GOWN GROWN PA PAR PARE PA SPA

SPAN PAN PANE PANEL PAP PAPA PAPAL PAR PARK PARKA PEA PEAR PEARL

the core element, which is singled out by an iteration, is slowly modified along the series. From ONE we move to OR, then ORE, O-ER, OUR, and to OUT. Then, O-ER is again picked up briefly until getting "retooled" as an OW sound in a new series. In other words, these substitutions in many series can be seen as the textual dynamics that summarizes the history of language.

The use of letter substitutions is as old as rhetoric, which is saying that it's a trick as old as language itself. But rather than treating this feature as a special case of language, a text such as Kostelanetz's pushes it in the foreground, reminding us of the humor and danger along the fragile fine fences we keep between one word and another, or between one meaning and another. If it is imaginable that "in one word, all words," then it would indeed be a miracle how we are able to see one among the so many, and hear one thing and not another million things.*  The word, after all, is something that is always morphing into many other pieces in each context that you begin using it, thus quickly suspending whatever it meant for meaning or language to be ever the "same" or "different."

 * Here we also touch on the the most basic question of historical linguistics: the origin of languages. Against the claim that the "Root Language of ALL languages is Om, also called the Language of One Sound... and which is realizable only in Deep Silence" (https://sites.google.com/site/ulagansessays/evolutionary-linguistics/root-language), we can cite another view that, "given the time elapsed since the origin of human language, every word from that time would have been replaced or changed beyond recognition in all languages today" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ur_language).