Questions of English

by Jeremy Marshall (Compiler)

Why is "f" used instead of "s" in old-fashioned writing and printing? What does "corned" mean in "corned beef?" How many words are there in the English language? Is the correct plural of "octopus" spelled "octopuses" or "octopi"? Since the Oxford Word and Language Service (OWLS, for short)
was launched in 1983, it has been flooded with queries such as the above. The questions come from university professors, schoolchildren, word-game enthusiasts, translators, historians, and monks--from people who have come across obscure words in an old will or in an ancient recipe book, or who have
had their curiosity piqued by one of the thousands of oddities attendant on our language.
In Questions of English , Jeremy Marshall and Mrs. Fred McDonald have gathered some of the most curious and enlightening questions that OWLS has fielded, in a volume that will fascinate word lovers everywhere. The topics range from the mundane to the exotic, from common questions of punctuation or
pronunciation (why, for instance, is the River Thames pronounced temz ?), to queries about bizarre words and neologisms (such as "nephelococcygeal," which means "of or related to Cloud-Cuckoo-Land"). Logophiles are in their element here, with fascinating discussions of obscure words as well as
intriguing facts about the familiar. We learn, for instance, that the political term "Tory" was originally an insulting nickname (probably related to the Irish word for thief), as were the terms "Whig," "Quaker," and "Methodist." The editors tell us that the word "gopher" comes from the French
gaufre or "honeycomb" (because the gopher's burrows honeycombed the ground) and that "zimbabwe" is an African word meaning "walled grave," a name given to the numerous ruined medieval settlements found in the state of Zimbabwe. And we discover that the plural of "octopus" should perhaps be
"octopodes" ("octopi" comes from the mistaken idea that "octopus" is a Latin word; it's actually a Latinized form of the Greek oktopous , whose plural is oktopodes ), but either "octopi" or "octopuses" are considered correct. In addition, the Owls puzzle over many spurious etymologies, such as for the
words "posh" (which probably does not stand for "Port Out Starboard Home"), "quiz," "snob," or "OK," and they provide a brief discussion of British and American English, which covers pronunciation (we say toma d o, they say toma t o), spelling, and vocabulary (in America, "mean" means "nasty," while in
Britain it means "cheap").
A joy for any lover of language, Questions of English brings the language to life with bright and often irreverent style. It is a browser's goldmine, packed with fascinating and useful facts about our native tongue.

Genres: Reference, Writing, Language

198 pages, Hardcover

First published April 20, 1995

Reviews

[Tim · Rating 2 out of 5]

May be fun for some, but not my cup of tea. A necessarily random collection/ragbag of answers (or not) to questions grouped into chapters such as "What is the origin of...?" (feisty, snob, wally, etc.). Given the arbitrariness of the selection it's no use as a reference book, and anything useful in here can be found by googling. (In fairness, the book is older than Google.) May please those who like trivia for its own sake, but that happens not to be me (I'm not knocking it, it's just not my thing).

[Michael Smith · Rating 3 out of 5]

In 1983 the Oxford University Press, home of the never-ending Oxford English Dictionary, launched the Oxford Word and Language Service (OWLS for short) as a free reference aid on matters of language and linguistics for everyone from adolescent students to businessmen to puzzle-enthusiasts to translators. Naturally (and as any reference librarian could predict), many of the enquiries they receive are either pretty dumb or amazingly naive, but what’s collected here is (mostly) well-meaning questions regarding the origins of English, the differences between the British and American versions, the legitimacy of words like “humongous,” why the “char” in “charwoman” has nothing to do with tea, and the proper term for a baby hedgehog. Some of their assertions might give an American pause, though. Is it true that Americans prefer “through” to the British “up to and including,” or that a Yank would always say “sure” where a Brit would say “certainly”? I don’t think so. And, in defining the American use of “biscuit” (a word that Brits reserve for cookies), they describe the former as “small scone-like balls of cooked dough, eaten with meat and gravy” -- which makes it clear that the folks at the Oxford UP never ate breakfast in Atlanta or Wichita!

[Sami]

how can I read it? help please