Dropping a letter changes a best-seller with a sophisticated “code”
into a new plot starring a slimy “cod.”
(image thanks to @darth)

Clever Words for Clever Word Lovers

What’s so attractive about words such that some people become logophiles (yep, that’s the official term for “word lovers”)?

• Perhaps it’s the puzzle of wordplay games like Scrabble where an aha moment lights up the brain when you figure out how to use all seven letters.

• Maybe it’s the social aspect of games like Words with Friends, when folks who choose a random opponent meet through the chat feature. Some even marry, putting two important words together: I do.

• But for many word lovers, it’s simply the thrill of the challenge.  There’s power there, too, for people like @darth, whose creative reinvention of book covers (above) just might change the course of literary history.

Oh I see. One little letter makes a mighty big difference. It could be for the better; it could be for the worse.

A marriage promise is for better or worse.
Which is it when just one letter moves things from “yours” to “ours”?
© Malsveta/iStock

The Oxford English Dictionary defines 750,000 words in the English language. Because languages are always changing and words have many different forms, Merriam-Webster reports that the number might go as high as one million. Either way, the English language is a big playground.

Warming Up

Myself a logophile and ready to play, I first improved some book titles in my kitchen:

—A favorite cookbook went from The Joy of Cooking to The Joy of Cooing. After all, isn’t that what romantic dinner conversation is all about?

—Losing an r from Elizabeth Gilbert’s best-seller, Eat, Pay, Love was next. Adding a T to Julia Child’s opus, Mastering the Tart of French Cooking led me to a good dessert.

Feeling my oats now, I turned my place into my palace and a sure-fire way to get a “yes” whenever I send invites to a bite of dinner.

Tiny change, big difference if you’re having a banquet
©AbleStock.com (L) and ©pabkov/iStock (R)

Imagination Kicks In

Just as books in the Harry Potter series suspend reality, so it is with wordplay and the title for the new underwater series: Harry Otter. Stealing an F leads to more fun and fantasizing about the plots in Animal Arm and Lie of Pi.

So it goes—whenever I play with words, my imagination runs wild. I start to picture scenes like these:

—An eerie atmosphere changes to an eerie catmosphere with eyes aglow and fur that turns to fury.

The catmospheric condition of the universe
© Eric Gevaert / Hemera

—On stage at the Lincoln Center, a ballerina in a spotted leotard becomes a leopard stalking prey.

—In a low-lit Nairobi night club, a mean ole mamba does the mambo.

—At a soiree aboard the haunted Queen Mary, an almost ghost turns out to be the host.

—In a close encounter of another kind, a Purple Martin house transforms into a purple Martian house.

More for the History Books

Wordplay has a long, illustrious history.

• Anagrams, in which the letters of a word like listen are rearranged into a new word like silent, became popular in Europe in the Middle Ages and may even date to the ancient Greeks.

• By the 17th Century, Louis XIII appointed a royal anagrammatist whose job it was to entertain the court by creating anagrams of people’s names.

• The venerable crossword puzzle, birthed by Arthur Wynne for the New York World, celebrated its 100th birthday on December 21, 2013. It has given millions of logophiles a century worth of fun.

It’s no wonder then that word lovers and wordplay are still going strong today, sometimes in a mash-up of modern days and history. To wit: When a dog friend of mine snatched an entire bag of chips, it brought to mind the Greek beauty Helen of Troy. Why?

Hers was the face that launched a thousand ships sparking the battle of Troy. His was the face that lunched a thousand chips barking at the dare of his ploy.

Helen of Troy and this good boy have a lot in common!
© Son GalleryTM / iStock

What fun! And you, too, can play. Enjoy good times and many “Oh, I see” moments inventing new titles for 20 famous books. Download the list and start playing, but—remember—you can change only one little letter.

Book titles VIA Pleated Jeans with input from reader comments and tweets to #bookswithalettermissing.

Find all kinds of creative word games at Merriam-Webster. 

Scrabble, invented during the Great Depression, is now owned by Hasbro. Words with Friends, developed in 2008 by Paul and David Bettner, is now owned by Zynga.

Comment on this post below, or inspire insight with your own OIC Moment here.