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Mar 6, 2008

"But words are things, and a small drop of ink, Falling like dew, upon a thought, produces That which makes thousands, perhaps millions, think." --George Gordon Byron

Meet the Proverbial Scholar

Paremiology -- the study of proverbs, from the Greek "paroimia." I stumble across this curious word in my background research, but I haven't a clue what it really means until I meet Wolfgang Mieder from the University of Vermont. This animated gentleman has built up a worldwide reputation during his 30-plus years of reveling in the common phrases people use to persuade, humor, or moralize. But the scope of Professor Mieder's devotion isn't fully apparent until he hands over a volume of his international bibliography of proverbs. (He has annotated entries for more than 7,000 publications, and soon that number will be all 10,000 publications in his archive.) What, exactly, is a proverb? "A concise statement of an apparent truth, which has had, has, or will have currency," he says, adding that it's generally 10 words or less.