Lexicography
Word association
From an employee of a tram company in Birkenhead to the deeply eccentric Alexander Ellis, a celebration of the army of unpaid contributors to the first edition of the OED
Swirling meditations on language
There is a particular sub-genre of books which are witty and erudite, comic and serious and often of a bibliophilic…
Incident
I had thought that the saying ‘Accidents will happen in the best regulated families’ was a vulgar reference to children…
Suicide
There was a marvellous man in Shakespeare’s day known as John Smyth the Sebaptist. ‘In an act so deeply shocking…
Licence to talk dirty
There aren’t many jobs that allow a nice middle-class Jewish boy to say ‘fuck’ in front of his parents. But…
The name game
In South Korea, some 20 million people share just five surnames. Every one of Denmark’s top 20 surnames ends in…
Hopefully
There was outrage last week when it was found that the Oxford English Dictionary had listed one sense of literally…
