d-s-p-i-t
I know that the “i” should be put on the BACK of the “p”, in that same way that “a” would be (e.g. in “pat”), but it seems much easier to write it on the INSIDE of the “p”, bringing the line through the centre of the large circle (as is done for “while”) before finishing with the “t”. With the p-a combination it all looks very clear, but with the p-i combination the “p” looks a bit weird (well it does when I write it). So I think they should have made a rule for b/b-i distinct from p/b-a/e. They didn’t so that’s that. But I wonder if my writing it like that could lead to ambiguities.
Correct: the broken circle goes on the back of the p because of the following t. However, you can make the outline even easier by using the shortcut of eliminating the t altogether. In that way, the broken circle stays inside. That’s the way the word is written in the 1916 New and Revised Edition.
Thanks Carlos,
I think I’ll follow the 1916 version in this. I couldn’t find “..pite” in my book, though there were many “..ite” words with the “t” omitted. The good thing about the pre-anniversary books is that it is not quite as specific as the Anniversary manual (though I know that teachers welcomed the Anniversary book due to it’s being more precise) but depends much more upon giving examples to follow.
P.S. I still don’t get emails of posts to the blog. I must have done something wrong in my settings somewhere by mistake. It doesn’t matter too much as I keep an eye out periodically.
“Despite” is in the 1916 Gregg Shorthand Dictionary, d-s-p-i.
In the Manual, I think it’s part of the “abbreviating principle”. Paragraph 68 lists some other words ending with the -ite sound, with t omitted: bright, delite, unite, night, tonight.
I suspect the change in Anniversary, with the t written, is because there are contexts where “despite” and “despise” could both be correct, and d-s-p-i could be read as “despise”.
“I, despite him, will never go there again.”
“I despise him, will never go there again.”
Lee
The analogical ending “-pire” is p-i in both Anniversary (paragraph 227) and the 1916 edition (paragraph 130). I think they decided to add the t in Anniversary to standardize the ending, however, since “despire” does not exist, I think the addition is redundant.
I had not realised there was a 1916 dictionary. So I looked in https://greggshorthand.github.io/index.html (which I thought was called angelfishy when I used to look at it often) and found it. I won’t be looking at it much as it would confuse my anniversary writing, but it was interesting in that the entries were alphabetical rather that grouped around the root word. Perhaps it was Gregg himself that did the anniversary dictionary — I know he was very keen on “word families”. Thanks Lee.
The Gregg Publishing Company issued an incredible volume of materials. It’s really impossible to grasp it all, or get a cohesive picture about their agenda.
I have a copy of their 1948 price list, and it makes my head spin.
The 1916 dictionary comes up pretty regularly on Ebay.
It’s important to remember that shorthand is a practical skill, for fast writing. So the details of the various versions don’t really matter, as long as the writer can record things rapidly.
Lee