Category: Books

18
Aug

Word Origins – Anatoly Liberman

This funny, charming, and conversational book not only tells the known origins of hundreds of words, but also shows how their origins were determined. Liberman, an internationally acclaimed etymologist, takes the reader by the hand and explains the many ways that English words can be made, and the many ways in which etymologists try to unearth the origins of words.

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19
Jun
20
May

Translation’s Forgotten History – Heekyoung Cho

40dots book postWhat place did translation have in the making of modern literature? And how might our understanding of a nation’s literature change when approached through the lens of translation?

Heekyoung Cho, assistant professor in the University of Washington’s Department of Asian Languages and Literature, addresses such questions in her book, “Translation’s Forgotten History: Russian Literature, Japanese Mediation, and the Formation of Modern Korean Literature.”

Translation, Cho argues, was not supplementary but was essential to creating a national literature. That is “particularly visible” in East Asian literature from the late 19thand early 20th centuries, she said — a time when countries were “building a concept, canon, and language of national literature as part of establishing themselves as modern nations.”

Also, the public perception of translations has changed over time, she said; translators used to be “highly visible authors and public intellectuals and translation itself was not expected to be ‘faithful’ or invisible, as it is today.”

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27
Apr

Does spelling matter? – Simon Horobin

k2-_6b61fce5-2678-4b31-89c2-e42646320eb1.v1This book narrates the history of English spelling from the Anglo-Saxons to the present-day, charting the various changes that have taken place and the impact these have had on the way we spell today. While good spelling is seen as socially and educationally desirable, many people struggle to spell common words like accommodate, occurrence, dependent. Is it our spelling system that is to blame, and should we therefore reform English spelling to make it easier to learn? Or are such calls for change further evidence of the dumbing-down of our educational standards, also witnessed by the tolerance of poor spelling in text-messaging and email? This book evaluates such views by considering previous attempts to reform the spelling of English and other languages, while also looking critically at claims that the electronic age heralds the demise of correct spelling.

20
Apr

You say potato – Ben Crystal & David Crystal

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You Say Potato is yet another successful collaborative book by David Crystal and Ben Crystal. The title derives from Let’s Call the Whole Thing Off sung by Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers in the film Shall We Dance. (Already got the tune in your head?)

This book is written in the form of an extensive dialogue as you read a chapter by David Crystal followed by a chapter by Ben Crystal. This creative form of the book gives the impression of a live talk, and if you have encountered the authors before – you will almost hear the accents.Read more…