"The Chaos!" - A poem about English by Gerard N. Trenité - American English Pronunciation

http://www.englishteachermelanie.com/2011/11/chaos-of-english-pronunciation-p...

A poem about the chaos of English pronunciation!

After you watch the video, tell me in the comments below if you were surprised by the pronunciation of any of the words!

This is a fun poem about the chaos of the English language, but you'll want to pull your hair out in frustration by the end of it! Don't worry about understanding the poem - there is no meaning! It's just a fun collection of many of the ridiculous irregularities of English spelling! Just listen to the pronunciation. Most native speakers would have difficulty pronouncing all these words, so don't worry if you find it difficult.

Here is what the author wrote about this poem in his book:

"In Appendix III I offer the reader a small collection of phonetical paradoxes. I gave it the form of a "poem," so that rhyme and rhythm might have a soothing effect on the bewildered learner, and lead him into the right path, the former in many cases indicating sound, the latter stress. Thus even-Stephen, senator-spectator. The last line contains an advice; my advice is - don't take it."

The only person who can pronounce this poem perfectly is the author himself. I have tried my best to pronounce each word using American pronunciation. However, this poem was meant to be read with a British accent, so some of the words don't rhyme with an American accent! Also, some of these words are old and are no longer used. I had to do a lot of research to find the correct pronunciation of many of these words. I learned a lot of new words! I primarily used the Merriam-Webster dictionary to check my pronunciation. However, there are many words with more than one pronunciation (bade, via, clangour, mauve, plait, wont, aye, topsail, neither, leisure, hygienic, Boleyn, groats, tarry, parry, Gaelic, grimace, hough, does), so I chose the best pronunciation to suit the poem.

There are many different versions of this poem. This poem was first published as an appendix to the book Drop your foreign accent by Gerard Nolst Trenité. It was a book of pronunciation exercises for students learning British pronunciation. The book was first published in 1909. The Chaos first appeared in the 1920 edition. With each successive edition of the book, the poem was expanded. The most complete version can be found on the website of The English Spelling Society (http://www.spellingsociety.org/journals/j17/caos.php). That version is 274 lines.

I was able to find the 1932 edition of the book at the Metro Toronto Reference Library (you can see photocopies of it on my website (http://www.englishteachermelanie.com). This is the version of the poem I chose to read.
Yes, I cut out large parts of the poem. There are a lot of old words & names of places in England that I have never heard and can't pronounce. This poem goes on for 8 pages & almost 250 lines ... people would get bored if I read the whole thing!


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I am Canadian. My accent and grammar are American, but sometimes my spelling is British.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• ESL
• EFL
• English
• pronunciation
• The Chaos
• Gerard N. Trenité
• Gerard N. Trenite
• Drop your foreign accent
• poetry
• poem
• American English pronunciation

[mmbmbmbmb]

Only Lord knows how I managed to learn English (as my 2nd language). Must have a good sense for it phonetically.

Your work on this is remarkable. How witty to put all this together ~ BRAVO! ~ and thanks Ian for sending it to me ;o)

[TeacherMelanie]

@mmbmbmbmb Lord knows how ANYONE manages to learn English! = ) Thank you for your kind words! I had a lot of fun putting this video together. Even though I did a lot of research, I still got some words wrong!

[lou0918]

i love this poem they help me at pronunciation of the chaos

thanks to you TeacherMelanie that you post these poem.

[TeacherMelanie]

@lou0918 I'm so happy that you liked this poem! I had so much fun making this video. = )

[djweaverbeaver]

Hi, I noticed that you mispronounced two words not related to town names. 1. topsails: while 'top-seyl' is an acceptable pronunciation in American (and Canadian) English, the correct pronunciation of this nautical term is 'TOP-suh'l' because the vowel sound is reduced in the unaccented syllable. 2. Housewife: it's not referring to a married woman who manages a household. It's a British term for a sewing box and is pronounced 'HUHZ-if'. After all, they're highlighting the tricky stuff!

[TeacherMelanie]

@djweaverbeaver Thank you for pointing those things out! I thought it was odd that 'housewife' was included in the poem. As I said in the description, the only person who can pronounce this poem perfectly is the author himself! = )

[mmbmbmbmb]

@TeacherMelanie ~ whoever manages to find something wrong with your utmost intelligent ~ yet also highly entertaining contribution ... is, in my opinion, nothing but a petty mistake-picker (look up that word ;o) ~ I think I just created it)

Thanks again ~ and kind regards from Canada

[brumplum]

I've admired for a while your video as probably the best non-British reading anywhere online - including your presentation! I've done a recording of the longer version of the poem and would be interested in your observations (see my channel)

[JosephTeachesEnglish]

Our langauage can be so confusing... arrgghhh!

:D

[TeacherMelanie]

@xausyy You're not alone! Not everyone is a fan of the poem. = )