Silent Letters…

You’re typing along, grudging through yet another essay for your English coursework and waffling a little to try and boost up the word count. You glance up, and notice a spelling error. Feeling a little stupid, you check for the accurate spelling of the incorrect word. And what’s the thing that tripped you up, and will have undoubtedly caught many others out too? A silent letter.

I witnessed my ginger friend’s anguish at the realisation of a silent letter in an everyday word today. We were stood in line at Nationwide Bank, waiting to withdraw money, when she suddenly pointed at a massive sign, gasping in shock. She had discovered the silent t in the word ‘mortgage’. This was followed by many hilarious and inaccurate pronunciations of mortgage – the final one pronounced as ‘mortagudges’. Oh dear…

What is the point in a silent letter? I mean, seriously, why do they even exist? I have a theory for the mysterious existence of silent letters. Back in the days of the English language being created, there was a sudden divide between the group of geniuses behind the spelling of words. One half of the group sensibly proposed each word should be spelt how it is pronounced. The other group made up for what they lacked in common sense by having a largely childish and stupid sense of humour. They decided that words should have hilarious spellings that have nothing to do with the word, such as ‘like’ being ‘prit’ and ‘hug’ being ‘kif’. There were many arguments over this pressing issue, but they eventually decided to meet each other in the middle. This agreement declared words to have spellings that were closely linked to their pronunciation, but occasionally words could have extra letters which were silent, such as ‘b’ in ‘doubt’ and ‘a’ in ‘aisle’.

Thanks to the comic few of the genius group, people are constantly mocked by the spell checker on their technological devices and made to look a fool. We are constantly laughed at by geniuses who lived hundreds of years agoThey have continued their legacy, both in silent letters hilarity, and in a super-breed of clever comedians. Well played, comic geniuses, well played.

If you read my theory through, I hope you’ll find that it is a very likely situation. Oh, those classic pranksters… If you disagree, then I am saddened by the lack of your imagination. But every time you forget a silent letter, you will not acknowledge the laughter of geniuses pounding through that red line underlining your incorrect word… Now whose the stupid one?

Well, my dear readers, do you constantly forget silent letters? Or am I just a bit of an idiot? Comment below! Much love to you all. Goodnight.

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