Harold A. Maio
Harold A Maio, 83, retired editor, is an advocate whose sole interest is in language, how we use it, how we misuse it, how it directs us and how we can direct it.
Harold offers this about himself:
Born 1937, raised a 50's boy, lived flower power, matured through marriage, kids, college degrees, conflicts, and happiness. I am a linguistic ethicist, a person who examines language for its moral content.
My first choice for a vocation was teaching, art. Ordering chaos in dimension. I taught for many years.
My second choice, many years later was German. Hearing for the first time "Die Dreigroschenoper," Brecht/Weill, I cried and wanted to know why. I knew the power of word, without understanding a single syllable. 'Die Liebe dauert oder dauert nicht, an dem oder jenem Ort." I learned German as I learned color.
I taught German for many years, university, college, high school, private lessons.
The combination of the freedom of art and the discipline of German, the marvelous structure, led me to my final choice, editing, the power of the word. How who says what, and why. From art, I learned variety, endless opportunity, creative inquiry, the mind as eye, not mirror. From German, I learned structure, discipline, and the art of word itself, the power of the word itself. Choice, each and every word a choice one consciously makes or word rules author. "Dichter" rules word. It is no small task.
Word can lead to the back of the bus, or beyond. Word can reflect, repeat, repair, renew, alter reality completely. One need only to know the possibility and choose.
