The Most Amazing Word

Back in my college days, I took a course in semantics. One of the more revelatory learnings I acquired from that course’s professor was the power of function words: all the “stuff” which fills in among the supposedly more robust verbs, nouns, adjectives, and adverbs. Presented with a paragraph of all those “important” words and no function words, it’s hard to make sense of it. Just a pile of verbiage, really. On the other hand, a paragraph of nothing except function words instantly, in your mind’s eye, acquires all the strength of an understandable structure — like a skyscraper’s underlying girders — because the function words define the relationships among words.

A classic example* is the first stanza of Lewis Carroll’s “Jabberwocky,” as seen here with the function (and other “null”) words dimmed out:

‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe.
All mimsy were the borogoves
And the mome rath outgrabe.

…and here, with the function words emphasized:

‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe.
All mimsy were the borogoves
And the mome rath outgrabe.

A few weeks ago, agent Nathan Bransford posted two open-ended questions on his blog, a week apart: “What’s Your Favorite Word?” and “What’s Your Least Favorite Word?” I can’t swear to this, yet I believe every single nominee in both categories — including my own — was an “important” word. Let’s take all those commenters at their (ahem) word, and assume those are their favorites and least favorites.

Per the title of this post here, though, what’s the single most amazing word in the English language — the word whose weight is out of all proportion to its size and apparent significance? I bet it’s a function word. Here’s my nominee:

but

I know. It’s (haha) just a conjunction. Think about it a little, though.

It stands with “and” as a handy-dandy way to join lists of words or phrases, especially entire sentences, to one another. Yet “and” (which probably appears more frequently) is superfluous in just about any context; you can replace “and” with a simple punctuation mark (comma, semi-colon, period even) and your list will be no less meaningful than before.

“But” adds a whole new level of complexity. Even the very form of the word, the shape of the letters, is suggestive: the squat, low center of gravity in the middle; the upraised arms at the ends — at the left (facing back at what preceded) closed off, the one to the right open. It’s like Atlas, holding a world in each hand… yet open only to the meaning of what comes after.

Indeed, not in every circumstance yet in most, “but” says, in no uncertain terms: Ignore what you just heard or read. Attend only to what follows.

Let’s try some examples:

I’d really like to see you tonight, but I have other plans.

versus:

I have other plans, but I’d really like to see you tonight.

Or:

Feel free to do anything you want, but do not hurt the prisoner.

versus:

Do not hurt the prisoner, but feel free to do anything you want.

Or:

I’m sick of rain, but I know it’s good for the farmers.

versus:

I know the farmers appreciate it, but I’m sick of rain.

See? In every case, even though the clauses in each version are semantically (and sometimes literally) identical, but changes everything. It shoves what came before under a rug, while seeming to give it pride of place at the beginning of the sentence. It sets up a reader’s (or listener’s) expectations, signaling to him or her You’re a fool if you think I’m about to take the former point of view.

In writing, in speaking, and of course in reading and listening, beware the but. It’s a tool of seduction. A weapon of betrayal. When you place or encounter a but, watch the way it hoists the two halves of a sentence, say, or heaps a dozen list items up in one hand only to toss them over its shoulder for the sake of the one item in the other.

Scary, scary. Three letters. Mere function word, yes. But what a word.