The Reading Vent & Rant Thread

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by Uncle Robin

It's a well-known, longstanding and significant difference between Nth American English and variants more aligned with British English. There are YouTube videos now several years old mocking the US vaersion of the idiom, and it has been discussed often over the last decade or more on various linguistics blogs I follow.

It feels wrong to me, but I try to remind my self that by their definition idioms (and indeed languages in general) are not bound by "logic"

I've not seen it in any traditionally published US book (unless you count the one I was ranting about). Online, yes, plenty. In books, no (except some self-published stuff).

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by arjaybe

"I could care less" is a commonly used phrase. Almost as common as the correct, original version.

Only common in USA which is < 6% of the world. I've never actually heard it, even when I was in the USA. Only read it in a few USA books.

Note loads of countries have non-USA English as common 2nd language, apart from the obvious English speaking ones. The EU still has two officially English speaking countries, Ireland and Malta.

[JSWolf]

When advice is giving to ignore ePub2 when making an eBook.

[John F]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

I've not seen it in any traditionally published US book (unless you count the one I was ranting about). Online, yes, plenty. In books, no (except some self-published stuff).

+1.

I can't say as I see it in common use either, although maybe through a slip of the tongue.

I think it is one of those things that non-USA English speaking people post about to make them feel superior. It gets them more YouTube hits.

[arjaybe]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

Never seen it in properly edited, traditionally published books before. Only in self-published books.

I see it in dialogue, where grammar doesn't matter as much.-)

[HLS]

I hate DNFing books but if you are bored out of your mind I just can't finish it and I feel like I wasted money. I picked up a Study in Drowning. Gorgeous sprayed edges of a library. I also rented the ebook from the library. It is technically a good book, but it was so wordy and drawn out and the chapters too long I just got bored. maybe i was pressured to just get it over with since I am trying to have a clean slate for 2025 reading.

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

The book I'm reading has quite a lot of errors. Some are obviously OCR errors, but not all - like several instances of "I could care less" where they should be "I couldn't care less".

No, it's not self-published. It's a well-known author from a major publisher (Tor). There was apparently even an editor, according to the copyright page. I wonder if he was asleep or drunk on the job?

Originally Posted by arjaybe

"I could care less" is a commonly used phrase. Almost as common as the correct, original version.

Originally Posted by Sirtel

Never seen it in properly edited, traditionally published books before. Only in self-published books.

Fiction authors/editors/publishers can hide behind the excuse that that character uses that expression. It's so common that I've even seen it on mobileread numerous times. It is sad that it caught on.

Certainly it is a valid reading experience rant subject.

[Deskisamess]

Originally Posted by j.p.s

Fiction authors/editors/publishers can hide behind the excuse that that character uses that expression. It's so common that I've even seen it on mobileread numerous times. It is sad that it caught on.

Certainly it is a valid reading experience rant subject.

Then they should have another character correct them.

[Dazrin]

Originally Posted by Quoth

Only common in USA which is < 6% of the world. I've never actually heard it, even when I was in the USA. Only read it in a few USA books.

Note loads of countries have non-USA English as common 2nd language, apart from the obvious English speaking ones. The EU still has two officially English speaking countries, Ireland and Malta.

Yes, only 6% of the world at large. But, when you consider people with English as a first language (~400M), it's closer to 80% (335M/400M). Since the idiom is an English language one that seems closer to accurate.

Considering English as a second language, 335M/2000M, it's still about 3x the 6% value. And I would guess that many of that 2B people have learned their English based on US English given the prevalence of Hollywood.

I've heard it both ways and both are fairly common in my corner of the US. I rarely see it used in writing in either form though. It would be weird to see "I could care less" written out though. I would expect most people to look at it and realize it's weird when they don't think about it when spoken.

[Uncle Robin]

Merriam-Webster cites a Canadian (which surprised me) using the phrase "could care less" in 1954. So its written usage predates the evil Interweb tubes and the degradation of English by quite a bit

[JSWolf]

Most people get the following wrong. When asked "Do you mind?", the answer usually is given as yes even though it should be no.

[Renate]

Well, it's like negative questions. They don't translate well out of English. "Don't you want to go to dinner?"

[nabsltd]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

Never seen it in properly edited, traditionally published books before. Only in self-published books.

I've seen it, along with "I could of been mistaken" (instead of "could have") and "He's lyin, is all I'm sayin." (omitting the apostrophe)

Both were intentional by the author to indicate the character's brain actually formed the words that way on purpose. And, these examples are from books that are now at least 20 years old, and some close to 50.

As far as I'm concerned, dialog in books has the same rules of grammar as dialog in reality...none.

[Uncle Robin]

Originally Posted by Renate

Well, it's like negative questions. They don't translate well out of English. "Don't you want to go to dinner?"

Questions of that structure make me wish English had a contradictory/negatory affirmative like the French "si" - so very useful!

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by Dazrin

Yes, only 6% of the world at large. But, when you consider people with English as a first language (~400M), it's closer to 80% (335M/400M). Since the idiom is an English language one that seems closer to accurate.

Minor nit is that the total population of the US may be 346M (last 2024 number I could find) but according to three pages on language statistics I've found, ~318M (~95%) speak English and ~261M (~78%) speak English as their first language so your number should be ~261/400M or ~65%.