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The Mother Tongue: English and How It Got That Way | 
 agrandir | Auteur: Bill Bryson
Créateur: Bill Bryson
Éditeur: Harper Perennial
Prix de liste: EUR 10,68
Acheter Neuf: EUR 5,69
Vous épargnez: EUR 4,99 (47%)
Neuf (16) D'occasion (12) de EUR 2,84
Évaluation moyenne des clients:  1 commentaires
Classement parmi les ventes: 669
Média: Broche
Édition: Reissue
Pages: 272
Poids (kg): 0.4
Dimension (cm): 7.8 x 5.3 x 0.8
ISBN: 0380715430
Code Décimal Dewey: 420.9
EAN: 9780380715435
ASIN: 0380715430
Date de publication: Novembre 2001
Disponibilité: Expedition sous 1 a 2 jours ouvres
Condition: Neuf - En parfait etat. S'il vous plait, patientez 4-14 jours ouvres pour la livraison - Remboursement garantie - Plus d'un million de clients servis et satisfaits - Assistance a la clientele en Francais.
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Amazon.com
Who would have thought that a book about English would be so entertaining? Certainly not this grammar-allergic reviewer, but The Mother Tongue pulls it off admirably. Bill Bryson--a zealot--is the right man for the job. Who else could rhapsodize about "the colorless murmur of the schwa" with a straight face? It is his unflagging enthusiasm, seeping from between every sentence, that carries the book. Bryson displays an encyclopedic knowledge of his topic, and this inevitably encourages a light tone; the more you know about a subject, the more absurd it becomes. No jokes are necessary, the facts do well enough by themselves, and Bryson supplies tens per page. As well as tossing off gems of fractured English (from a Japanese eraser: "This product will self-destruct in Mother Earth."), Bryson frequently takes time to compare the idiosyncratic tongue with other languages. Not only does this give a laugh (one word: Welsh), and always shed considerable light, it also makes the reader feel fortunate to speak English.
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| Commentaires des clients:
Bill is having fun with the tongue. Avril 29, 2007
B. Chandler (Arlington, Texas)
0 sur 1 ont trouvé ce commentaire utile
This book contains more than you expect. Bill Bryson covers language its self with a focus on English. The book covers speech from a historical view, a physical view, an environmental view, a utilitarian view, and many other views. If you find the tape version, you will want to play the tape over again as it cruses through many concepts that leave you thinking and speculating how it could have all gone differently.
A highlight for me (aside from his dirty word list) was the recognition that we try to impose Old Latin syntaxes on Modern English and it can get redicules.
My only disappointment comes when he mentions things I have already read and gets it wrong or off the mark. You have to worry a little about what you do not know and if to trust him. Still it is a fun book.
The advantage of the tape is that you actually hear the pronunciations. When it is a matter of spelling the reader will spell it out for you. Also the reader has the ability to change accents to fit the dialect samples.
The disadvantage is when you want to turn back to a particular page for cross-reference; there is no page to turn. So I would be smart to own both versions.
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Merlin's Cave | |
