David Crystal
Author
Language
English
Description
In this discursive jaunt through the groves and thickets of the English language, David Crystal creates a mesmerizing and entertaining narrative account of his encounters with the language and its speakers. Woven from personal reflections, historical allusions, and observations of travelers, this fascinating journey through the language we use every day will have readers thinking twice about each word they speak. Starting in Wales and moving from...
Author
Pub. Date
2015.
Edition
First U.S. Edition.
Language
English
Description
"The triumphant concluding volume in David Crystal's classic trilogy on the English language combines the first history of English punctuation with a complete guide on how to use it. Behind every punctuation mark lies a thousand stories. The punctuation of English, marked with occasional rationality, is founded on arbitrariness and littered with oddities. For a system of a few dozen marks it generates a disproportionate degree of uncertainty and passion,...
Author
Pub. Date
[2015]
Language
English
Description
The Oxford Illustrated Shakespeare Dictionary is the first of its kind, a brand new illustrated alphabetical dictionary of all the words and meanings students of Shakespeare need to know. Every word has an example sentence selected from the twelve most studied plays including Macbeth, Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, A Midsummer Night's Dream, and Henry V. Usage notes and theatre notes provide additional background to Shakespearean times and the performance...
Author
Pub. Date
[2017]
Language
English
Description
It's the most simple, unassuming, innocent-looking verb: 'to be'. Yet it is jam-packed with more different meanings, forms, and uses than any other English word. As he reveals be's multiple incarnations, David Crystal takes us to the heart of our flexible and changing language. He tells the intriguing story in 26 chapters, each linked to a particular usage. We meet circumstantial 'be' ('how are you?'), numerical 'be' ('two and two is four'), quotative...
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