In dismal times like this one’s mind invariably goes back to James Thurber, the wonderful mid-C20 American cartoonist and humorist (sic). Here he is describing an unusually dim but extra burly Polish-American student grappling to answer a VERY simple question:

One day when we were on the subject of transportation and distribution, it came Bolenciecwz’s turn to answer a question. “Name one means of transportation,” the professor said to him.

No light came into the big tackle‟s eyes. “Just any means of transportation,” said the professor. Bolenciecwz sat staring at him.

“That is,” pursued the professor, “any medium, agency, or method of going from one place to another.” Bolenciecwz had the look of a man who is being led into a trap. “You may choose among steam, horse-drawn, or electrically propelled vehicles,” said the instructor. “I might suggest the one which we commonly take in making long journeys across land.”

There was a profound silence in which everybody stirred uneasily, including Bolenciecwz and Mr. Bassum. Mr. Bassum abruptly broke this silence in an amazing manner. “Choo-choo-choo,” he said, in a low voice, and turned instantly scarlet. He glanced appealingly around the room. All of us, of course, shared Mr. Bassum‟s desire that Bolenciecwz should stay abreast of the class in economics, for the Illinois game, one of the hardest and most important of the season, was only a week off.

“Toot, toot, too-toooooootf” some student with a deep voice moaned, and we all looked encouragingly at Bolenciecwz…

The notable point of course is that in this account of the story on the Internet the spelling of Bolenciecwz is impossibly un-Polish, perhaps deliberately so as part of the laconic amusement. Bolenciewicz looks much better to me, if not a real Polish name. Indeed, this version was used in a comedy movie loosely based on Thurber’s story.

Here for good measure is Thurber’s drawing of the great Bolenciecwz struggling to get his grey matter whirring away at top speed. Note that the caption adds another variant of his name: Bolenciecwcz.

Impossible to write this story today. Spelling a foreigner’s name wrong in a way teasing the complexity of its spelling is horrible patriarchal raaaaaacism.