Sir, – Your article on the prisonees who defected from Loughan house (“Loughan House escapees recaptured”, April 26th) reawakened my confusion about the use of “-er” and “-ee” “to create words such as “attendees” and the like.
If an employer is one who employs (active verb) and a payee one who is paid (passive verb), why is one who attends not an attender and one who escapes not an escaper?
Followed to a logical conclusion, your reportee who was the writee of the article may have talked to the prison wardees about the possibility that the three prisonees may have had a drivee waiting for them (perhaps in a Range Rovee with a trailee) when they decided to become abscondees, but gave themselves up to their pursuees after a few hours when there was no sign of their helpees. – Yours, etc,
