World English Day

Yesterday, April 23, I learnt very recently from a Google Doodle made for the occasion, was the UN World English Language Day. It was chosen - not inappropriately, I believe - because it was the date on which William Shakespeare was born and also supposedly died. The UN decided in 2010 to observe the day every year as such. Their website article claims that today one in four human beings uses English in one way or the other. Both Shakespeare and Thomas Carlyle would have smiled: I think it was the latter who said towards the end of the 18th century that Shakespeare was more valuable to 'us' (the British) than the empire, and so it has turned out to be. Via Shakespeare, the very best of what it once meant to be English has been spread around the world. But certainly both Shakespeare and Carlyle would have been astounded to see how much and how diversely the language has changed since their times, and what people are doing with it these days. Although, come to think of it, as one of the supremely great creative artists of all time and therefore an inveterate experimenter and pusher of boundaries, Shakespeare would probably have been more amused than shocked.

English and Shakespeare have fed me all my life. Materially, aesthetically, intellectually and spiritually. My debt to them is immeasurable, but I thank them every single day.

However, in this context, as an observant and thinking man, I would like to put on record a few ideas.

1. If you learn English for a purely utilitarian purpose - to wit, passing school exams and getting a job - you are bound to learn it poorly, which you will gradually realize with dismay as the years roll by. If it is worth learning, it is worth learning well.

2. Don't be taken in by fancy labels and tall claims: many schools, coaching institutes and internet mentors don't know much English at all, and while they are eager to fleece you, they will teach you little, and what is worse, they will teach you a lot of things that are just plain wrong. Not knowing is much better than 'knowing' wrong things. 

3. You don't have to disrespect and neglect your native tongue in order to learn good English. Indeed, I lament the great disservice that has been done by (West-) Bengalis to their vernacular over the last fifty years in their haste to become slavish imitators of the sahibs: very few Bengalis can read, write or speak fluent and correct Bangla today, and that has rarely been compensated by a really good grasp of the English language. From Rammohun Roy to Satyajit, they have all shown that you can be equally a master of both Bangla and English.

4. English grants you access to all the great books of the world, ancient and modern, spiritual, artistic, philosophical, scientific and technical, as no single other language does, or is ever likely to. So learn English well in order that the doors of the world's knowledge can be opened widest for you.

5. Finally, do not let the latrine slush of social media push you down into the gutter of what used once to be called pidgin, or 'coolie English'. I have no intention of being called elitist, or a snob, or a 'grammar Nazi', but if you imagine that knowledge of language needs no discipline of the mind, no hard work, no sense of standards, you have lost sight of both culture and civilization. Remember, 'I does' is plain wrong, writing 'Sir was' when you mean 'Sir is' is not a small mistake, 'He stopped to look' and 'he stopped looking' mean exactly opposite things, saying a natural sight is 'sick' when you mean lovely is weird, brilliant engineering is not 'insane', everything in this world is not 'great' or 'amazing', nor is anyone cool because s/he is hot. It only means your brains have fallen out, and you have joined the ranks of the great (mentally-) unwashed. No glory in that, though there might be safety in numbers, of the kind that is appropriate only for quadrupeds.

Happy English learning to all.