Letters - 23 September 2011
From meanings to mental health
The letter killeth
In the thirty years that I have been reading letters in the Friend there have been many occasions when one person has taken exception to the words of another.
Some words, when used in legal contexts or in science, have very precise meanings. Others, in less formal speech, especially poetry, are similes, metaphors, or other kinds of analogies. The dispute begins when one Friend uses an analogy which, in its way, might throw useful and sometimes surprising light on a topic. Analogies never fit perfectly, and another Friend criticises the part of the analogy which doesn’t fit, as if it invalidates the whole perception, and sometimes even accuses the first Friend of bad faith.
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