Ain't was: Seeking Grammar Police Ruling

[Carol]

Carol earlier:
> > "Ain't" (originally spelled "an't" and probably pronounced
"ant"--see "David Copperfield," for example) ... I'm not sure when or
why "an't" became "ain't" but it may have become associated with
illiteracy at about the same time.
> 
> Kemper now:
> That's curious.  Moby Dick, an ocean away, was published at about
the same time as David Copperfield.  In the first chapter, Ishmael, a
 scholar turned sailor (ok, he was a school teacher) asks the reader,
"Who ain't a slave? Tell me that."
> 
> Of course... I don't know if the first edition had 'an't' instead of
'ain't'.  Or maybe the pronunciation of 'an't' changed in America, and
Melville reflected that.
> 
> 25 years or so later, Tom Sawyer's Aunt Polly gently laughs and asks
herself about Tom, "Ain't he played me tricks enough like that for me
to be looking out for him by this time?"
> 
> Twain quotes himself, in A Tramp Abroad, as yelling at the age of 10
(circa 1845), "Fire, fire! JUMP AND RUN, THE BOAT'S AFIRE AND THERE
AIN'T A MINUTE TO LOSE!"  Of course, the book was written some 30+
years later, so maybe he said 'an't' or even 'isn't'.  Just scanning
his non-fiction, I haven't noticed any use of the word 'ain't' that
isn't in a quote.  But don't hold me to that being true.
> 
> Kemper
>
Carol responds:
Obviously, Ishmael, as a schoolmaster, could well represent correct
English of his time--though he's philosophizing colloquially in what I
can only call the style of an educated seaman (the narrative is not
contemporary with the events in "Moby Dick"--he's seen a bit of "the
watery part of the world" since then). Here's the context, so you can
judge for yourself:

"Do you think the archangel Gabriel thinks anything the less of me,
because I promptly and respectfully obey that old hunks {an old sea
captain] in that particular instance? Who ain't a slave? Tell me that.
Well, then, however the old sea-captains may order me about--however
they may thump and punch me about, I have the satisfaction of knowing
that it is all right; that everybody else is one way or other served
in much the same way--either in a physical or metaphysical point of
view, that is; and so the universal thump is passed round, and all
hands should rub each other's shoulder-blades, and be content." 

Schoolmaster or not, Ishmael reflects the New England dialect of his
time, and, unlike David Copperfield, he's not a gentleman, in the
sense of an Englishman born into the gentry, Americans having
abandoned the concepts of gentry and aristocracy along with royalty
and an established church. Would, say, a Harvard-educated American of
Ishmael's time have said "ain't"? I don't know. 

Aunt Polly, on the other hand, is not well-educated. She probably
attended a one-room schoolhouse for six years or so (as Tom does when
he's not playing hooky), and she speaks in a Southern dialect not very
different from the wholly uneducated Pap Finn's. And Twain himself, or
should we say Samuel Clemens, since he's quoting his private persona,
is speaking Southern dialect in the quoted instance. His narrative
style is more formal and correct than the dialogue he's quoting. It's
like a Cockney speaking in dialect at home but speaking BBC English
("received pronunciation") in a job interview or at work.

I don't think, however, that Twain/Clemens considered "ain't" to be
proper English, any more than he thought that Huckleberry Finn and Tom
Sawyer could spell correctly. Melville's Ishmael is a bit more
difficult to figure out. I don't think that "Moby Dick" was edited, at
least not much, and any significant differences would be between the
British and American first editions rather than the American first
edition and the manuscript. At one point, he (Melville as Ishmael)
even refers to Stubbs as the third mate, and nobody caught it.

Carol, trying to recall whether Byron or Shelley ever used "ain't" (or
"an't") and thinking that they didn't (though Byron managed to rhyme
"Juan" with "ruin"! <eg>)