The Secret Life of the English Language: Buttering Parsnips and Twocking Chavs

(Paperback)

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Description

Our langauge is one of delight and curiosity. BUTTERING PARSNIPS, TWOCKING CHAVS is a guided tour of English, exploring the origins of words, their changing meaning, lexical peculiarities, word games and lost words, presented in lists, small passages of narrative text, amusing quotations and nuggets of amazing facts.

This must-have compendium shows that words have a matchless power to entertain. Here you will find enough new words and phrases to last a lifetime. Idioms frolic beside cliches, catchphrases, proverbs, eponyms, acronyms, spoonerisms and split infinitives. Text messages cavort alongside business jargon and rap slang to produce a language that is both witty and bizarre and sometimes frankly outstanding.

So whether you're a yuppie or a woopie, a sinbad or dinky, a spod or even a wazzock, these pages will provide endless hours of delight and fascination.

Reviews

[a] tasty gallimaufry of linguistic oddities - INDEPENDENT

an entertaining compendium showing, above all else, that words have a matchless power to entertain - HUDDERSFIELD DAILY EXAMINER

Author Bio

David Pickering is an experienced reference book compiler, freelance since 1992. He has contributed (often as sole author or chief editor) to around 200 books in the fields of general reference, English language, the arts, history and popular interest. He has also broadcast many times on a variety of subjects on radio and television. He lives in Buckingham with his wife and two sons. Martin H. Manser has been a professional reference book editor since 1980. He has compiled or edited more than 150 reference books, particularly English-language dictionaries, thesauruses, and Bible reference titles. He is also a language trainer and consultant with national companies and organisations. He and his wife live in Aylesbury and have a son and a daughter.