LEND ME YOUR EAR: BOOKS SHOW ENGLISH IS STILL OUR LANGUAGE (PART I)

Everyone who reads these columns knows I've had a lifelong love-hate relationship with typewriters. Just about the time I decide to abandon my struggles with a once-trusty Smith-Corona, something happens to persuade me to re-establish our closeness.

This time it was the arrival of four gift books between Christmas and New Year's. Two are slight but provocative, the other two add enormously to the books devoted to language already gracing my shelves.

Of the two lesser numbers, relayed in the same package, one is deeply serious, the other serious but funny. Both are written by preachers.

"Tea Time with God" is a daily devotional, beautifully designed and accompanied by a generous amount of high-quality tea, its purpose being to offer a respite from the ordinary cares of daily living. At this writing, I have stayed the course though not always at the designated hour, nor with a guest to share the message with the tea.

The other, a paperback titled "You Might Be a Preacher If ...", proved so delightful to a six-year-old first-grader at Cape Girardeau's Trinity Lutheran school, his grandmother was hard put to drag him away for his regular after-school games with his grandparents, though he loves to play ball and adores his grandparents. Pen-and-ink drawings in the book helped him understand the humor, and he came near exploding with laughter over the idea of finding a chicken in the collection plate. Anyone out there remember when preachers were paid in produce?

The two books devoted to language and humor are the latest works of Richard Lederer and Peg Bracken. Everyone who reads anything must recognize Lederer as the author of "Crazy English." Peg Bracken is best remembered for "The I Hate to Cook Book." Lederer has now come up with "Adventures of a Verbivore," Peg with "On Getting Old for the First Time."

"The I Hate to Cook Book" was followed by a rash of tongue-in-cheek hate books that belied the author's charge. Shortly after, Peg told me she had covered every subject she knew enough to write about, and now that she had re-married, she planned to spend the rest of her life seeing America with her husband. Especially California, where she had lived for years while traveling abroad.

Old age, however, crept up on Peg, and this was something new. In response to her minor complaints, a doctor reminded her she had never been "this age" before. (At the time, Peg observed, she was a mere child of 73.) A little later, she saw "a nice-looking elderly couple" on TV, and on realizing it was herself and her husband, she knew the dye was cast. She felt duty-bound to write the book her M.D. had inspired.

For "On Getting Old for the First Time," Peg created an alter-ego named Emily. Like the author, Emily loves cats and versifying, and is pictured throughout the 125 pages of the book writing verses with a cat on her lap. Samples of Emily's humongous thoughts, with drawings to match, include:

The classiest kind of an afternoon nap

Takes a comfortable couch with a cat on your lap.

Latest scientific finding:

Old people need reminding.

Peg the author has much to say about changes in education in the cyber world, refreshing our memories of the way we were mired in the Gazintas, as in 3 gazinta 12 4 times. Today, she points out, third-graders have calculators and talk RAMs, ROMs, and space flights. Peg is definitely not attuned to the Net and the Web, and as readers know, I share her feelings. Still, I didn't have to open her book to learn she hasn't lost her edge. Her seal on the back of the letter enclosed reads:

May the Tender Chicken Lumps of Contentment outnumber the Yukky Turnip Bits of Dejection in your Casserole of Life.

One of the amusing words Peg dreamed up for people whose memories she suggested could be dimmed by age is "nincompoopery" -- an ailment we believe is suffered by nincompoops of any age. We herewith deny that Peg Bracken has succumbed to this affliction regardless of her supposition. "On Getting Old for the First Time" is full of chuckles and an altogether delightful read.

Top-flight writer Richard Lederer claims he is still searching for Cyberspace. At this writing we are out of space, and suspect punmaster Lederer has taken it with him "jest for the pun of it."

Part II, nonetheless, is in the works and will appear as soon as the champion of punnitry returns for the feast. Great expectorations will be highlighted along with punishment and quackers.

Aileen Lorberg is a language columnist for the Southeast Missourian.