Entry for April 08, 2008

ABOUT FAMILY AND GRAMMAR

A few days ago my colleague, who is “collecting” her vacation trips, asked me, if I had been to Malta. “No”, I said, “but my son has” – “But your son is not you!” she exclaimed.

For my wife and me our children are the extension of our own selves. With them we travel to Malta or Australia, teach at a university in England and do our PhD in Washington D.C. Just as some twenty-thirty years ago when we went with them to the seaside, to picnics, learned English, discussed school events, and had family readings of Ukrainian humor round the kitchen table.

The tables are turned now. When our son returned from a linguistic conference in Sidney and brought a boomerang as a present, I started flying it with no less gusto, than my son was once blowing a policeman’s whistle which I brought to him from London when he was still a kid.

A slight digression: Sometimes nouns, normally used with the article in the English language, may have no article if a more global meaning is to be imparted to the noun (often in titles). Good examples are Earnest Hemingway’s story “Cat in the Rain”, John Braine’s novel “Room at the Top” or W.S.Maugham’s “Theatre”. An English grammar also says that “nouns expressing relationship do not take the article when used by members of the family” (e.g. “I’d like to see Mother”). I guess it’s also because there’s much more behind the words “Mom”, “Dad”, “brother”, “sister” than their dictionary meanings suggest.

So, if you have a closer look at the picture of the lady with the white tulips in the background, you will notice us, her parents, standing next to her amidst the American spring. And the name of the picture is “Daughter”. There’s no article before the noun.