Do writers devise the best insults? Hephzibah Anderson for BBC Culture looks at some of the most biting words writers aim at each other: Who was called “A great cow full of ink”?
Category: news
Sep 03
Don’t feel bad: you overlook typos because you’re really smart
Here’s an interesting science-based explanation of why we fail to see mistakes in our own writing. This supports the common practice of having someone with ‘fresh eyes’ proofread any important document. From Nick Stockton at wired.com.
Jul 03
London celebrates books
I’m on my way to London today for my first visit longer than 3 hours, and am really hope to find a few of these benches!
May 19
The whole nine yards
Jan 15
Dynamic language
Nov 13
2012 Word of the Year
The Oxford English Dictionary has selected omnishambles as the word of the year for 2012. According to BBC News, “the word – meaning a situation which is shambolic from every possible angle – was coined in 2009 by the writers of BBC political satire The Thick of It.” This term could prove useful soon as …
Sep 27
Imported English
Sep 23
Plague of plagiarism
The frequency of plagiarism scandals in the news is worrying to editors. American journalists Fareed Zakaria and Jonah Lehrer and Romanian and Hungarian politicians have been recently accused of recycling their own work or claiming that of others. An editor’s role is not to police the writer, but a good editor may notice red flags. …
Aug 29
Oldest English words
Researchers have recently released interesting analysis of our language, using historical documents to trace the usages of words and relationships between languages. This BBC article reports a handful of words that are among the oldest (I, we, two, and three, but not four), and which words the research predicts may soon fall from use (dirty, …
Aug 17