Language lessons from a master delivered masterfully: Crystal-clear.
The author of numerous works about the history and uses of English returns with a brief, illuminating disquisition on the history and varied tasks of the verb “to be.”
That little buzzing verb is a word we employ in myriads of ways for myriads of reasons, from the “existential” to the “ludic”—and more. In this concise and clear account, Crystal (Making Sense: The Glamorous Story of English Grammar, 2017, etc.) fashions an unusual chapter organization: a description of the usage, many historical examples (Shakespeare and the Bible are prominent), some cartoons from Punch (and some created especially for this volume by cartoonist Ed McLachlan), and an occasional panel (Crystal’s term) that focuses on a related topic—e.g., the imperative form. The author’s cadre of readers will know that he is no prescriptivist. In his section on the expression “woe is me,” he emits a tiny snarl at the prescriptive approach, noting the insistence of some on “woe is I.” Nor does Crystal tear his hair or claw his face when dealing with slang and the language of texting (“textese,” he calls it). As a descriptivist, the author recognizes that railing against usage is generally pointless—grammar and usage move on (ain’t was once “correct,” he notes)—and reminds us that earlier “telegraph” generations dealt with “telegramese.” He also traces the history of each usage—many go back to Anglo-Saxon—and shows how time has, or has not, altered it. His examples range wide and include Hamlet, popular song, newspaper headlines, and novels by Dickens and Thackeray. He does not neglect former President Bill Clinton’s comment, during his sex-scandal testimony, about how “it depends on what the meaning of the word is is.” And so it does.
Language lessons from a master delivered masterfully: Crystal-clear.Pub Date: June 1, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-19-879109-6
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Oxford Univ.
Review Posted Online: April 16, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2017
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.
The legendary booze-addled metal rocker turned reality-TV star comes clean in his tell-all autobiography.
Although brought up in the bleak British factory town of Aston, John “Ozzy” Osbourne’s tragicomic rags-to-riches tale is somehow quintessentially American. It’s an epic dream/nightmare that takes him from Winson Green prison in 1966 to a presidential dinner with George W. Bush in 2004. Tracing his adult life from petty thief and slaughterhouse worker to rock star, Osbourne’s first-person slang-and-expletive-driven style comes off like he’s casually relating his story while knocking back pints at the pub. “What you read here,” he writes, “is what dribbled out of the jelly I call my brain when I asked it for my life story.” During the late 1960s his transformation from inept shoplifter to notorious Black Sabbath frontman was unlikely enough. In fact, the band got its first paying gigs by waiting outside concert venues hoping the regularly scheduled act wouldn’t show. After a few years, Osbourne and his bandmates were touring America and becoming millionaires from their riff-heavy doom music. As expected, with success came personal excess and inevitable alienation from the other members of the group. But as a solo performer, Osbourne’s predilection for guns, drink, drugs, near-death experiences, cruelty to animals and relieving himself in public soon became the stuff of legend. His most infamous exploits—biting the head off a bat and accidentally urinating on the Alamo—are addressed, but they seem tame compared to other dark moments of his checkered past: nearly killing his wife Sharon during an alcohol-induced blackout, waking up after a bender in the middle of a busy highway, burning down his backyard, etc. Osbourne is confessional to a fault, jeopardizing his demonic-rocker reputation with glib remarks about his love for Paul McCartney and Robin Williams. The most distinguishing feature of the book is the staggering chapter-by-chapter accumulation of drunken mishaps, bodily dysfunctions and drug-induced mayhem over a 40-plus-year career—a résumé of anti-social atrocities comparable to any of rock ’n’ roll’s most reckless outlaws.
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-446-56989-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2009
IN THE NEWS
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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