The Language Wars
A History of Proper English
Picador
Available: 10/30/12
5.48 x 8.31 · 416 pages
9781250013941
CDN $28.50
· pb
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Exemplary. . . Hitchings has created a fascinating, wholly readable, and gratifyingly informative book." - Financial Times (London)
The English language is a battlefield. Since the age of Shakespeare, arguments over correct usage have been bitter; often they've had more to do with morality, politics, and the values of the age than with language itself. Peopled with intriguing characters such as Jonathan Swift, Lewis Carroll, and Lenny Bruce, The Language Wars is essential reading for anyone interested in the contemporary state of the English language, its contested history, and its future.
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Henry Hitchings was born in 1974. He is the author of The Secret Life of Words, Who's Afraid of Jane Austen?, and Defining the World . He has contributed to many newspapers and magazines and is the theater critic for the London Evening Standard.
