[1428] Octopusses

Guest poem sent in by Anustup Datta <anustupd@>

I don't know what the fuss is,
Cooking's easy if you try.
Just take two octopusses
And you've got an octopi.

         -- Simon Goodway

By rights, Nash should have written this. I had never heard of Simon Goodway
before I stumbled onto this little gem, and I still don't know anything
about him, but anyone who can bake an octopi out of octopusses in four lines
surely knows a thing or two about poetry. This bit of whimsy ranks way up
there with the best of Hein and Dahl - and as I had mentally promised myself
that this review should not exceed the poem, that's it. Just run it on a day
when you feel bluer than the sky.

Regards
Anustup

[Martin adds]

Don't worry, I'm not feeling blue - just thought I'd run it :)

Nash has (unsurprisingly) done something vaguely similar - see Poem #848.
And on octopi, Steven Pinker has this to say: "The -us in octopus is not the
Latin noun ending that switches to the -i in the plural, but the Greek pous
(foot). The etymologically defensible octopodes is not an improvement".

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Hotjobs: Enter the "Signing Bonus" Sweepstakes
http://hotjobs.sweepstakes.yahoo.com/signingbonus

[this poem is archived, accessible and awaiting your comments at]
http://www.cs.rice.edu/~ssiyer/minstrels/poems/1428.html
To subscribe, send a blank mail to <minstrels-subscribe@>.



Yahoo! Groups Links

To visit your group on the web, go to:
 http://groups.yahoo.com/group/minstrels/

To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:

 http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/

From: Amit Chakrabarti <ac@>

* Sitara Miyer (ssiyer@) [040113 17:58]:
> And on octopi, Steven Pinker has this to say: "The -us in octopus is not the
> Latin noun ending that switches to the -i in the plural, but the Greek pous
> (foot). The etymologically defensible octopodes is not an improvement".

And grand old man OED has this to say:

Pl. octopodes (ktpdiz), anglicized octopuses. [mod.L. octpus, a. Gr. ,
acc. - eight-footed, f.  eight + , - foot.]

Not even a mention of "octopi". Way to go!

From: "Sarah Casseday" <sarahcasseday@>

Hope you don't feel bluer than the sky!  How could you after this
delightful poem?

From: "Property Rental Network" <chrisg@>

ONly a Goodway could write such a fine piece of poetry!
Regards
Chris Goodway 
Adelaide Australia.