Sir, – Frank McNally suggests Irish-English is the origin of the growing use of "haitch" rather than "aitch" as the name of the eighth letter of the alphabet in southern England (An Irishman's Diary, April 7th).
But while “haitch” may be relatively recent in the south of England, it’s long been widespread in the north of England and Scotland, which is likely to be where the Irish got it from in the first place, so it might just be spreading southwards in England, not crossing the Irish Sea.
Another possibility is that whingers from the south of England, who have long been fighting a rearguard action against h-dropping, are now being doubly tormented for the pointless sin of trying to stop linguistic changes. People who try to stop a language changing usually don’t understand that by the time they notice the change, the battle’s probably already lost.
The teachers, parents, and writers of letters to the editor who whine that “haitch” really grates on them are also likely to complain about pronunciations of “Harry” and “house” without the “h”. So they should really be celebrating their offspring’s reinstatement of the aspirated “haitch” in the name of the letter itself. This fits the general pattern that the name of the letter, with few exceptions, starts with the sound that the letter usually represents.
Once “haitch” becomes firmly established even in the south of England, perhaps – to misquote Henry Higgins’s tongue-twister – even “In Hertford, Hereford and Hampshire h-dropping will hardly ever happen”.
Joking aside, it will probably continue regardless, much to the distress of the whingeing classes. – Yours, etc,
KEVIN McCAFFERTY,
Rådal,
Norway.