Ever wonder what the wright of wheelwright means? How about the monger of warmonger? John explains.
* FULL TRANSCRIPT *
John McWhorter: You know something that's always tickled me? Certain words where you think you know what they mean — and you do — but if you had to divide them into parts, you might find yourself coming a cropper (kind of like with that expression).
In this bonus segment, I just want to get to three words that we kind of let pass, that actually are not quite what we think. And so, for example, playwright. Notice how it's always hard to write it? You might think that it was spelled P-L-A-Y-W-R-I-T-E, but it isn't. You have to know. And a part of you wonders, “Well, if it’s somebody who writes a play, then how come ‘write’ is spelled W-R-I-G-H-T in that instance?” And you don't really have time to think about it.
Well, you know why that is? It's because that wright in playwright doesn't refer to writing.
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