q: Off With Their Heads (Reader Comments)
Dobe suggests "are <— share," which brings up an extension or variation of the Queen's Game: beheading by two letters to produce a non-rhyming word. I'm not certain yet whether such two-letter beheadments are significantly more common than the one-letter version; so far I've only found a few:
- at <— beat/heat
- cord <— record
- eat <— great
- me <— name
Of course, one could generalize further to allow removing any number of letters from the beginning of the word to produce a non-rhyming word, but I suspect that much expansion opens the field too wide.
Jim Moskowitz found an expanded version of the beheadable sentence in Dmitri Borgmann's Language on Vacation:
Show this bold Prussian that praises slaughter, slaughter brings rout. Teach this slaughter-lover his fall nears.
Which, of course, beheads to: "How his old Russian hat raises laughter—laughter rings out! Each, his laughter over, is all ears."
(Last updated: 31 August 1997)