Ickle

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header image via Pexels

Ickle is a little word — literally, it means ‘little’ — that came to my notice while reading recently, and it’s one of those pieces of vocabulary that isn’t terribly useful but is somehow incredibly fun.

Ickle.

Saying it is a delight — the throaty /k/ followed by the tongue-on-teeth /l/ — as, I think, would be using it.

I’d be unlikely to use this word (correctly), however. Unless I was writing a limerick. Or engaging in British baby talk. (It’s derived from British baby talk, by the way. Which is why, when used by a baby, it’s endearing. And when it’s used by a non-baby, it’s kind of a way of calling someone a ‘baby’. Think: 10-year-olds speaking derogatorily to their 7-year-old siblings.)

Essentially, this little word meaning ‘little’ is a little bit insulting. If you’re a little bugger yourself, but bigger than any little britches you might be elder to.

Americans, supposedly, once used ‘ickle’ as a miniaturized term for ‘icicle’. (This, according to Webster.)

But personally, I’m inclined to invent my own definition for words like this.

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History

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One of the things I’ve long found delightful about reading books is how much history they contain.

I don’t mean that in reading history books one learns history — though of course, one does — but rather that, in reading any book one can learn something about the time in which it was written. This is true of nonfiction and educational books in many ways, in that – especially where scientific and anthropological information is concerned – you can see *exactly* when an idea or a discovery or a theory was NEW if you read a book related to the concept at its inception. (Darwin, anyone?) But it is also true of fiction.

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Bachelors at the Brownstone: Archie Goodwin & the Eccentric Culinary Florist, Detectives

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saturated color photo of a Rex Stout Nero Wolfe omnibus cover

If you’re a fan of Golden Age detective fiction, have ever perused the Rex Stout catalog, have heard of an eccentric fat detective who kept orchids, or watched American television in 1981, you might have an inkling of who I’m talking about when I say, “Nero Wolfe.”

From Stout’s first Nero Wolfe novel (Fer De Lance, published in 19341) to his last (A Family Affair, published in 1975), we are treated to 46 books filled with the combined (and successful) efforts of an obese genius and his legman to detect crime. For a hefty fee.

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A-to-Z 2023: Reading

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As of right now (6:10pm PST, 03/30/2023), I truly don’t know how this is going to go, BUT I am going to give it a go.

A [loose] theme I will be working with (or through, or perhaps around) for the 2023 April A-to-Z is READING.

Since I have yet to construct even a single post in this main, I cannot tell you what to expect.

It may be a piece of vocabulary I’ve gleaned from reading. Perhaps it will be something that I learned — a phenomena, a factoid, a throwback to phrenology — as a result of reading. Probably you will see things about books and authors and characters. Maybe you will see a quote or two. Definitely there will be anecdotes. (That’s kind of my schtick.) There is the tiniest fraction of a chance that you will encounter a bit of humor.

It is, however, highly unlikely that there will be sex/i/ness.

(Except, of course, for the fact that YOU will be reading my blurbages about reading, you sexy thing you.)

(And for the fact that reading is sexy.)

SO.

I am off to write about reading.

Not like… right now… (I have a book to finish!) BUT:

Really, REALLY soon.

(Right after I’m done with my evening reading.)