Subj : hero
To   : Roy Witt
From : Ardith Hinton
Date : Fri Mar 02 2018 18:00:57

Hi, Roy!  Recently you wrote in a message to alexander koryagin:

ak>  A man went across a frozen river and fell through an
ak>  icy crack. Another man jumped into the water and pulled
ak>  him out. A witness began prasing the saviour, calling
ak>  him a hero. "You were so magnanimous!

ak>  The witness thought that the hero hated the fallen man
ak>  very much, but he saved him anyway on the ground of
ak>  humanism and high morality. I had a difficulty when I
ak>  chose the word. Can you suggest you variant?

RW>  The 'witness' could have been a learned man with a
RW>  vocabulary that matches the use of such an extraordinary
RW>  word as magnanimous.


            Uh-huh.  Such beloved authors as James Fenimore Cooper, Mark Twain, 
and Robert Louis Stevenson used "in character" dialogue which reflected the way 
various people might have spoken.  Joe Average probably wouldn't use words like 
"magnanimous".  Without knowing more about this particular individual, however, 
we can't easily guess the limits of his vocabulary.



RW>  A doctor, lawyer, college professor, maybe even a judge
RW>  in life, but a witness to an accident in the meantime, who
RW>  apparently knew of a disliking between the saved and savior,
RW>  would perhaps have used the word 'noble'...because it was
RW>  a noble thing that he did to help someone with whom he wasn't
RW>  exactly on friendly terms.


            My initial response to Alexander's query would have been "generous"
.... but according to my Gage dictionary "magnanimous" = "noble in soul or mind"
*and* "generous in forgiving".  IOW we were both right.  A doctor, lawyer, etc. 
could indeed be familiar enough with Latin to say "magnanimous" if he felt that 
was the word which best explained his interpretation of what was going on.  :-)




--- timEd/386 1.10.y2k+
 * Origin: Wits' End, Vancouver CANADA (1:153/716)

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