BBC Sherlock Fan Forum - Serving Sherlockians since February 2012 / Benedict's English

**Posted by miriel68** May 14, 2013 7:07 am

So, since I am stuck in a kind of limbo, waiting till June to see STID, out of desperation I began to watch and read all BC interviews appearing these days on line. And since the journalists tend to ask always the same questions I concentrated on HOW rather than WHAT is B. saying
My conclusion: we should write a petion domanding to include Benedict's interviews as an obligatory material on English courses for foreigners. It is a huge delight to spot all these beautiful words that seem to spring spontaneously from his lips. Just read the Smaug article: only few B. sentences quoted and you have such a delightful expressions as

" the first literary experience that played out as a visual fantasy" "vainglorious", "human frailty", "literal Achilles heel", "biped mammal"...

(ok, I am not a native speaker, so sometimes I can have problems with distinguishing acculturated expressions from more common ones and vice versa)

So, care to add to the list? Could we have "learn English with Benedict Cumberbatch" thread?

**Posted by SusiGo** May 14, 2013 10:37 am

Excellent idea, miriel. I love listening to him because he seems to be so much in love with his language. His vocabulary is enormous and he always manages to surprise me with words I didn't know before, vernacular and educated alike. When I find a jewel, I'll post it here.

**Posted by crazybbcamerican** May 14, 2013 12:17 pm

I finally got to sit and watch the Stephen Hawking episodes that he narrated. The subject is very intense and when they fade from Stephen's voice to Benedict's, it's just bone-chilling. There are lots of words that I will never hear the same way again: the beauty of the cosmos, all things come together through gravity, and my personal favorite we are all made of the smoke of the Big Bang. Bad enough the subject matter blew my mind, but that voice, too?

**Posted by SusiGo** May 14, 2013 1:16 pm

I found a nice sentence (Benedict on Smaug):

"This incredibly vainglorious, beautiful, fantastical creature of myth with such power and human frailty, his vanity and self-promotion and ego being his own self-destruction really, and not realizing his weakness and his strength, and having a literal Achilles heel — it fascinated me." (From Wall Street Journal)

**Posted by Wholocked** May 15, 2013 12:20 am

I often learn new words from his interviews. Most recently was him describing JJ Abrams as a "polymath" which I had to look up. Expand your vocabulary with BC!

**Posted by miriel68** May 15, 2013 2:34 pm

Wholocked wrote:
Expand your vocabulary with BC!

It could be a catchy title for a new English coursebook for CPE examinations, lol.

Now here is the word that made my day today:

he is such a CATANKEROUS mind (Benedict about Sherlock)

Now, find me another actor who would use casually such an expression and I promise to treat you to a pizza next time you are in Rome

**Posted by SusiGo** May 15, 2013 3:29 pm

A nice example from the Naked Scientists interview. Please note that it's a direct transcript from what he said:

"The very variety of disciplines and the extraordinarily different disciplines that science encompasses, answer questions as varied and broad as How can we use a new drug to patterns in the brain that may determine whether or not Alzheimer’s is going to take hold or you know psychotropic drugs that need to be researched and marketed and have an immediate application to questions of how we came into existence and what existence is and the very nature of our being"

**Posted by Davina** May 15, 2013 6:14 pm

Cantankerous.

But I'm not being cantankerous. I am trying to be helpful.

**Posted by Mary Me** May 15, 2013 6:53 pm

SusiGo wrote:
A nice example from the Naked Scientists interview. Please note that it's a direct transcript from what he said:

"The very variety of disciplines and the extraordinarily different disciplines that science encompasses, answer questions as varied and broad as How can we use a new drug to patterns in the brain that may determine whether or not Alzheimer’s is going to take hold or you know psychotropic drugs that need to be researched and marketed and have an immediate application to questions of how we came into existence and what existence is and the very nature of our being"

Holy...! Did he even breathe in between?

**Posted by miriel68** May 15, 2013 8:08 pm

Davina wrote:
Cantankerous.

But I'm not being cantankerous. I am trying to be helpful.

LOL! You see, I am not even able to spell it and he is able to say it!

**Posted by SusiGo** May 15, 2013 8:54 pm

Mary Me wrote:
SusiGo wrote:
A nice example from the Naked Scientists interview. Please note that it's a direct transcript from what he said:

"The very variety of disciplines and the extraordinarily different disciplines that science encompasses, answer questions as varied and broad as How can we use a new drug to patterns in the brain that may determine whether or not Alzheimer’s is going to take hold or you know psychotropic drugs that need to be researched and marketed and have an immediate application to questions of how we came into existence and what existence is and the very nature of our being"
Holy...! Did he even breathe in between?

This is just one sentence from one answer. It was much longer.

**Posted by Wholocked** May 16, 2013 12:31 am

Cantankerous is a brilliant word. And very applicable to Sherlock!

**Posted by Davina** May 16, 2013 6:50 am

He can be obstreperous too.

**Posted by SusiGo** May 16, 2013 6:59 am

Davina wrote:
He can be obstreperous too.

That's a good one, too. And sometimes he's loquacious.

**Posted by miriel68** May 16, 2013 3:13 pm

=13pxHowever, Sherlock also has moments when he is a "low-spectrum autistic" And he is not " someone who’s likely to be changed by corrective analysis"

Fortunately, Benedict's experience with fans has been "incredibly benign" so far.

I think I will buy a block notes and begin to write down all these nice expressions. After a month my English should experience an exponentional growth.

Last edited by miriel68 (May 16, 2013 3:49 pm)

**Posted by Mary Me** May 16, 2013 3:32 pm

miriel68 wrote:
I think I will buy a block notes and begin to write down all these nice expressions. After a month my English should experience an exponentional growth.

My thoughts exactly!

**Posted by Davina** May 16, 2013 4:29 pm

Exponential - gosh a great word to use though.

**Posted by miriel68** May 17, 2013 2:13 pm

Davina wrote:
Exponential - gosh a great word to use though.

Well, you see it's BC benign influence that sends me on this lexical hyperbolic trajectory...

some nice pics from vulture article (worth reading!: http://www.vulture.com/2013/05/benedict-cumberbatch-in-star-trek.html)

..I wanted Harrison voice to have something slightly manufactured...
...he’s not this unsurpassable physical entity... He’s a spearhead—someone who just carves his way through....
probably, however, my favourite expression of the artical is the "the multiple layers"

BTW, reading between the lines you can guess that Benedict was HUGELY disgusted by David Letterman modes, even if he is too much a gentleman to state it openly.

**Posted by Russell** May 17, 2013 5:43 pm

What a great article.... thanks! Love it when the interviewer knows at least enough of who/what they're talking about to get to neat thoughts about Ben/his roles, instead of rehashing the same stuff or wasting space asking for detailed movie secrets he can't give away (or bad jokes/cluelessness, like Letterman.... ;P)

**Posted by SusiGo** May 17, 2013 6:46 pm

Wonderful article, well-informed and thoughtful.