Let me just say, I picked the essay "Maine Speech" by opening "One Man's Meat" without looking. White's October 1940 essay is exactly where the book opened to. Then let me say, I am from here. I grew up in Maine and have lived from Caribou to Cumberland, but I don't talk like E.B. White accuses we Mainers for speaking. This is one essay I must classify has historical, having little carry over from the past to present. What do other Mainers have to say? I'm sure, like myself, you fellow Mainers don't have accents either.

That said, I did find the essay to be humorous. I guess the "from away" thing still is used. But I don't call manure dressing. I call stuffing from the turkey on Thanksgiving, dressing. There's little chance I'll interchange those two terms. I've never heard a road called "the tar" either. I did use the word "wicked" quite a bit in junior high school, I don't know if that's a Maine term or not. And I cannot properly pronounce "ayuh". Although one of my grandmothers said it correctly all the time.

Do you ever think about the way you speak and how it defines you? What do you make of the last paragraph of the essay? White compares the language of his adopted state as country talk to that of New York "... where the air was crowded with loud intellectual formations...". How would someone compare Maine with New York now?

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