“Tell me, is it okay to say, it gives me a great pleasure to announce this year’s winner?”
“No, it isn’t. The standard expression is, ‘It gives me great pleasure’ — without the indefinite article ‘a’.”
“I see. How about this example? As captain of the cricket team, it gives me great pleasure to introduce you to our star batsman.”
A great pleasure
“That’s a good example. But if you wish to use ‘a’ in the sentence, then you normally say, ‘It is a great pleasure to introduce you to our next contestant’. You could also say...”
“Well, I ran into Sujatha this morning, and it wasn’t a pleasant experience. That woman is crazy, I tell you. I greeted her, and she started shouting at me for no reason at all.”
“Join the club, my friend. I think she’s angry because...”
“Join the club? What club are you talking about?”
“When someone says that something bad happened to them, and you respond by saying, ‘Join the club’, what you’re suggesting is that you’re in a similar situation. A similar thing happened to you as well. The two of you are in the same boat.”
“So, it’s your way of telling me that Sujatha shouted at you as well?”
“I think I was the first person she shouted at. And like you, I’m quite puzzled by it. Here’s another example. If what the speaker said really confused you, join the club!”
“How about this example? If Prem tricked you into lending him money, join the club.”
“Sounds good! Americans tend to say, ‘Welcome to the club’. Remember, both expressions are mostly used in informal contexts.”
“So, what did you do when Sujatha started shouting at you? Did you shout back at her?”
“That would have made her even more angry, don’t you think?”
“Well, I shouted back at her and she threw a book at me. Luckily, she missed.”
Throw or hurl?
“Did she ‘throw’ the book at you or did she ‘hurl’ it at you?”
“What’s the difference? I thought the two words meant the same thing.”
“They don’t! When you hurl an object at someone, you’re throwing it at him with a great deal of force. Your aim is to hit the individual and cause him pain or injury.”
“Whereas in the case of a ‘throw’, it could be gentle or it could be extremely hard.”
“That’s right. Janani was so angry that she hurled the paperweight at her husband.”
“During the protest, students started hurling stones and bottles at the policemen.”
“In the movie, the villain hurls a chair at the window and escapes.”
“Is that how you escaped from Sujatha? By hurling something at the...”
“No. After shouting at me, she turned her attention to Jacob. I edged away when she started giving him an earful.”
“Edged away? Does it mean that you ran away from there?”
“Just the opposite. When you ‘edge away’ from someone or something, you try not to draw attention to yourself. You move cautiously or slowly. When the mother realised that the other children were teasing her son, she quietly edged him away from them.”
“How about this example? The ladies edged away from the old man when he pulled a dead snake out of his coat pocket.”
“That’s a good example. I’m not particularly fond of snakes.”
“Welcome to the club!”
* * * * *
I refuse to join any club that would have me as a member. — Groucho Marx
The author teaches at the English and Foreign Languages University, Hyderabad. upendrankye@gmail.com
