I Wonder What That Means?

[woodwardiocom]

I was reading A Wrinkle In Time to my daughter yesterday, and noticed that Meg's mother is "Mrs. Murry" while the witches are "Mrs Whatsit" and so forth. I.e., her mom gets a period at the end of "Mrs." and the witches don't.

My best guess is that this is meant to indicate that "Mrs" is a title for Mrs. Murry, but actually their name for the witches...

Comments

[badseed1980.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that's what I would assume.

[weegoddess.livejournal.com]

Agreed. That would make the most sense. And kudos to you for noticing that little detail. I never had.

[mrw42.livejournal.com]

Really? I'd guess it was bad editing, because Mrs. is an (unpronounceable) _abbreviation_ for Misses, and that is why it has a period. Well, that's why it has a period in the U.S. anyway. In the UK, it is used without a period. Go figure. :-)

[woodwardiocom.livejournal.com]

It's clearly intentional, since it's absolutely consistent, across multiple editions.

[whswhs.livejournal.com]

So perhaps Mrs Who, Mrs Which, and Mrs Whatsit are British and therefore have magical powers?

[whswhs.livejournal.com]

"Reading to my daughter" sounded so natural to me that it took an hour or so for me to realize that your daughter's English vocabulary is currently quite limited. I take it you're giving her the experience of being read to to accustom her to sitting on your lap, listening to your voice, hearing formal language, being in the presence of a book, and so on as positive things?

[woodwardiocom.livejournal.com]

All that, and my voice is apparently soothing.

[archangelbeth]

If you have big enough type, don't discount that she's taking in the idea of print=sounds. Go ahead and underline the text with your finger as you read. (I did the Glen Doman technique, in Teach Your Baby to Read. One is supposed to limit it to 5-10 cards at a time, but I recall once when, desperate to provide Input to the fussy child, I went through about 30 of them, with her sitting in rapt fascination.

It is a sanity-saver, to have a child able to read to herself early. It also gives a head start on breaking the vocabulary tests, and appreciating classic books such as Little Fuzzy, which is always important. O;> )

[fadethecat.livejournal.com]

In one of L'Engle's non-fic/autobiographical books, she actually discusses why she wanted the witches to have that particular form of Mrs, and how she had to fight with editors to keep it so. Alas, I no longer recall the specific reason, but I do know the explanation is somewhere out there, in print.