The Articles of Dragon: "Ay pronunseeAYshun gyd"

I am nothing if not a horrible nerd about too many of the things that matter to me. And one of the things that matters a great deal to me is language. 

When I was in school, I enjoyed diagramming sentences and making proper use of the subjunctive mood. Spelling was one of my favorite subjects and I used to proudly tell anyone who would listen that I only ever spelled one word wrong on a spelling test during my entire elementary school career (Tuesday, if you can believe it). I was (am?) that annoying kid who corrected other people's grammar – and pronunciation.

Consequently, I absolutely adored Frank Mentzer's article, "Ay pronunseeAYshun gyd," which appeared in issue #93 of Dragon (January 1985). Over the course of five pages, Mentzer sets out to present the correct pronunciations for some of the weirder and more obscure words and names found in Dungeons & Dragons and AD&D materials. Of course, Mentzer is quick to note that he personally doesn't believe there is such a thing as a "right" or a "wrong" pronunciation (or spelling). Thus, the pronunciations he offers in the article are simply the "preferred" or even "most common" rather than the correct ones. Such descriptivist nonsense didn't hold any water with me when I was fifteen and it holds even less now, but I feel it's important to mention Mentzer's comment nonetheless, since I'm sure someone will bring it up in the comments in order to defend the rectitude of his idiosyncratic pronunciation of lich or drow or whatever.

As I said, I really enjoyed this article, since it gave me a weapon with which to bludgeon my less verbally adept friends. Thus equipped, I was ready to defend “proper” pronunciation with the zeal of a paladin guarding a sacred relic. My friends humored me (mostly). After all, I'd been doing this sort of thing for years before this article ever appeared. Fortunately, I’ve mellowed somewhat over the years – at least, that’s what I tell myself – but the truth is that I still sometimes look at Mentzer's article just to be sure that I wasn't mistaken in how to say certain words and names. 

Apropos of nothing, I assure you.