In a Manner of Speaking

If you're not learning something with every obituary you read, you're not alive.

When I got to the third paragraph of Bruce Weber's NYT obit on A.E. Hotchner, friend and biographer —notably to Ernest Hemingway—and lemonade and salad dressing partner with Paul Newman in a philanthropic business that has donated millions, I thought faux pas, how could Bruce write that Hotchner was "not to the manner born?"

It's not "to the manor born?" Bruce and his highly literate crew over there on 8th Avenue wouldn't have let that one slip, right? They didn't.

A.E. (Aaron Edward) passed away at 102, and as such, his advance obit was written by Mr. Weber before he retired from the NYT (or took a buyout). Normally, when someone over 90 passes away you can count on an obit written by Robert McFadden. But as the ship pulls away from dock, the advance obits for the nonagenarians and centurions will be written by Margalit Fox and Bruce Weber, who were assigned to keep them updated on sunny days when no one was dying to get on the obit page. (Margalit has also left the paper.)

So, before thinking I'm right, I consult the O.E.D. And there, under "manner" is an example and definition of "to the manner born" with the source is given as Shakespeare's Hamlet.

...to the manner born [Shakes. Hamlet] destined by birth to be subject to some custom; collog. naturally fitted for some position or employment."

Manor and manner. The words are much alike. Even in envisioned context. "To the manor born..." Certainly the Crawley daughters in Downton Abbey, Mary, Edith and Sybil, were certainly "to the manner born, and "to the manor born."

And Tom Branson, the IRA-chauffeur/mechanic, Sybil's husband...certainly "not to the manner/manor born." At least as far as it goes to being a member of the Crawley clan. See, much confusion.

I asked my wife to spell "manner" in the context of saying "to the manor born." M-a-n-n-e-r. Apparently not.

Of course her conditioned spelling response is reinforced by watching nearly everything British on the NPR stations (we get three here in New York), where she is addicted to the 1990s reruns of  "To the Manor Born." The English language.

Okay, so in what context in Hamlet is the expression "to the manner born" uttered?

Phrase Finder tells us:

HORATIO: Is it a custom?
HAMLET:  Ay, marry is't;
 But to my mind, though I am a native here
 And to the manner born, it is a custom
 More honour'd in the breach than the observance.

The meaning is clear. Hamlet knows the custom being spoken of because he is native, that is, born locally.

To paraphrase Jimmy Breslin about the journalists that can write long sentences: the guys at the Times went to college.

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