A meme called grammar (Destiny)

by Funkmon , Wednesday, October 07, 2015, 22:25 (3430 days ago) @ Beorn

I read that. I admire his dedication to grammar. I have to say this:

Barely.

The phrase has been around in English since old English, when we were very German. Its phrasing is dative. You can see it here: "wa is me þet ic am swa fremede wiþ þe" The phrase didn't originate in the bible, though the Tyndale one used "Woe is unto me" in Corinthians. The KJV uses "unto" in Job as well.

By Shakespeare's time, it had been an idiom for hundreds of years, and its grammar rendered irrelevant, as by this time we used an objective case. Its use was not poetic, as the guy suggests, but a remnant of old grammar. For example, Shakespeare also uses "methinks," which is clearly dative in origin as well, meaning it seems to me. We keep remnants of Old English grammar around in plenty of places. In fact, most of our objective case pronouns are the dative equivalents, not the accusative ones. Is it arguable that he should use hin instead of him? Or whon instead of whom? Barely.

The poetic use the author is arguing for IS legitimate in other situations, but the "woe is me" phrase largely exists today because it is an idiom, not a grammatically incorrect phrase for some poetic use, like "I am woe." Its use as a condition is distinct from its use in woe is me.

So, that guy who wrote that article appears to me to be stretching to hypercorrect, that is, correcting something not even wrong in the first place, due to a misunderstanding he has. Then when people tell him, he resolutely ignores them and says it's a much more modern poetic use.

For my money, the argument for woe is I in that article are only slightly better than ones that we should call the pineapple a spinefruit.