Ill communication

Fry's Planet Word, then. Another of those moderately worthy, moderately weighty documentary series which can get away with appearing on terrestrial TV by virtue of being scheduled on Sunday evenings and being presented by a national treasure; which is understandably superficial in its coverage and scope but which nevertheless proves engaging viewing.

Of course, much of it came across as an extended love letter to language from Fry, but that's no bad thing given his unbridled enthusiasm and adoration. When he was speaking about the joy of libraries, you genuinely did get the sense they give him a quasi-sexual, quasi-sensual thrill.

If I had to pick one specific disappointment, it was that Fry spoke (rightly) about the folly of trying to control and police language but was far too soft on the ostriches of the Academie Francaise, burying their heads in the sand behind closed doors and pompously pronouncing what should and what shouldn't be allowed through the hallowed gates and into the French language. It's the linguistic equivalent of trying to hold back the tide with a fishing net. Pontificating about the need to protect French from the oppressive and insidious influence of English, the old blazered duffers completely missed the irony in simultaneously insisting on the importance of controlling and suppressing dialects to ensure the uniformity of language throughout the Francophone world. In short, their "true" French is as much of a bullying linguistic brute as English.

While Fry clearly disagrees, he didn't really press the point, preferring to spend the rest of that programme revelling in and celebrating the richness and diversity of languages and dialects around the world. Anyone whose interest was piqued by that particular programme and who would like to dig deeper would be encouraged to investigate Spoken Here. Mark Abley's book covers the ecological argument endorsed by Fry (namely, that linguistic diversity is something worth preserving, just as environmental conservation is seen as an inherently good thing) and explores the distinction between protecting a living language as an act of rebellion, to keep the flame alive, and preserving it as a dead tongue out of xenophobic conservatism.