Fascinating answers in school history test

I know it`s a sign of advancing age when you begin to long for the golden days of the past but try as I might I can't help pining for the time when nearly everyone could speak and/ or write correct English.

Let me say right now I don't blame today's young people for the destitute state of the English language. They're being brought up on a diet of gobbledegook, political correctness and texting. The result is bound to be a form of English that is as mangled as a train crash.

Just to highlight what I mean about the problems today's kids face growing up in a lingual environment that resembles impenetrable Amazonian jungle, here's an offering I've treasured for some time:

"We wanted to clearly differentiate the offerings of the three unique markets in order to deliver real value propositions to investors and companies alike. We also want to promote NZX as the parent brand as this represents the totality of the Exchange's offering. It gives us much more flexibility to expand and grow our offerings in the future and better gears the Exchange for delivery against its new mandate."

That was an appallingly ham-fisted attempt to describe the then-revamped New Zealand Stock Exchange - and it came from the communications manager no less. No wonder kids resort to texting an abbreviated form of English.

That`s just one all-too-frequent example of the gobbledegook we face these days.

However, the prevalence of political correctness must also shoulder much of the blame for the inept English that permeates our lives.

I`m totally perplexed now that we live in a world where beneficiaries have become clients and clients have becomes guests.

When you travel on a train or an aircraft you`re not a ``guest" (a person who receives hospitality or is paid for by another), you are a "customer" (a person who pays for services or goods).

And since when did fat people become ``differently weighted", or the homeless the "residentially flexible".

Libraries are now often described as "educational resource centres" and bald men are the "follicularly challenged".

My grumbles about all of the above - and a widespread lack of general knowledge these days - were triggered when this week I came across what are purported to be the results of a genuine school history test.

This may be apocryphal but I'd like to share it anyway because: a) It's amusing; b) It is indicative of the state of education today; c) It helps fill out this column.

Here goes:

1) "Ancient Egypt was inhabited by mummies and they all wrote in hydraulics."

At least if people wrote in hydraulics today it would possibly be more uplifting.

2) "Solomon had 300 wives and 700 porcupines."

He obviously wasn't wise enough to stay out of prickly situations.

3) "Joan of Arc was burned to a steak and canonised by Bernard Shaw."

And I thought Joan was a very rare woman.

4) "Johann Bach wrote a great many musical compositions and had a large number of children. In between he practised on an old spinster, which he kept up in his attic. Bach died from 1750 to the present. Bach was the most famous composer in the world and so was Handel. Handel was half German, half Italian and half English. He was very large."

I was fascinated by this information. I never knew that Bach made overtures to a spinster in his attic.

5) "Queen Elizabeth was the Virgin Queen. As a queen she was a success. When she exposed herself before her troops they all shouted `hurrah'."

Well, it was one way to arrest a decline in army recruitment and the Elizabethan era was indeed a time of great achievement as evidenced by the following revelation.

6) "Sir Francis Drake circumcised the world with a 100-foot clipper."

American history does not escape unscathed in this test either.

7) "Delegates from the original 13 states formed the Contented Congress. Thomas Jefferson, a Virgin, and Benjamin Franklin were two singers of The Declaration of Independence. Franklin discovered electricity by rubbing two cats backwards and declared, `A horse divided against itself cannot stand'. Franklin died in 1790 and is still dead."

Well, not only do I now know the state of literacy and general knowledge today but also, given the rising price of power and recent blackouts, I've finally found a use for our two resident moggies.