Newspapers are perennially unable to tame English
Meru Governor Peter Munya in Imenti South on June 10, 2017. PHOTO | PHOEBE OKALL | NATION MEDIA GROUP
What you need to know:
"Fetted" was an invention of one of the newspaper’s subeditors that the chief subeditor and the editorial copy reviser allowed to pass muster, a word that even the ever-inventive and ever-receptive English language has never yet quite absorbed.
Never mind the other claim, that the governor was “dorned” or that he had ventured into a political territory belonging to a pugnacious and never-say-die political pugilist known as Kiraitu Murungi.
A heading on page 20 of the Nation edition of June 12 was inescapable because, among other things, (a) it was the lead on that page and (b) the subeditor in charge of the page had caused the heading to be printed in blue (a colour which, therefore, went quite agreeably with that of the politician’s own chic Mobutu jacket).
The headline, however, howled: “Governor Munya is fetted by Meru elders at rally in Nkubu”. That was the only question: what on earth is it to fet? Yet the subeditor in charge of the page was so proud of his word that he or she even ordered the heading to be printed in colour (a shade of azure that went quite agreeably with that of the governor’s Gizenga costume).
The heading was thus inescapable, especially since it was the leading one on that page. Yet one question stared at you like Gorgon’s face. Why did Meru elders want to “fet” the politician? Indeed, what on this earth is it to fet anybody? I ask because I really do not know. Yet to fet is the only possible infinitive that one can form whenever one doubles the letter t in the hypothetical verb to fet when transforming it into certain other English tenses and moods.
SUBEDITOR'S INVENTION
Let me ask again: what does it mean to fet? Any Tom, Dick and Harriet can hazard a guess. Meru Governor Peter Munya was not being fetted (whatever that may mean). Fetted was an invention of one of the newspaper’s subeditors that the chief subeditor and the editorial copy reviser allowed to pass muster, a word that even the ever-inventive and ever-receptive English language has never yet quite absorbed.
No, our politician was only being feted (with only one t), where to “fete” is to honour with celebration, often with vigelegele and most likely a treading of the measure.
Governor Munya is an active, happy-go-lucky and people-friendly fellow, with a permanent smile at the corners of his lips, a smile often as wide as the Cheshire Cat’s (in Lewis Carroll’s marvellous tale Alice in Wonderland).
POLITICAL PUGILIST
Never mind the other claim, that the governor was “dorned” or that he had ventured into a political territory belonging to a pugnacious and never-say-die political pugilist known as Kiraitu Murungi. The question is: what is it to dorn?
The likelihood is that the politician is merely confused between to don (to put on clothes) and dorn (a word that I have encountered only in the German language, where it refers to a thorn — and Mr Murungi is quite a thorn on the sides of his myriad of political adversaries).
In the case of newspapers perennially unable to tame the English language completely, dorned is probably a confusion with donned (which means “wore” or “put on clothes”), a context in which even dawned may intervene to cause more trouble for our English-language journalists.
Philip Ochieng is a retired journalist.
