作者简介

David Crystal works from his home in Holyhead, North Wales, as a writer, editor, lecturer, and broadcaster. Born in Lisburn, Northern Ireland in 1941, he spent his early years in Holyhead. His family moved to Liverpool in 1951, and he received his secondary schooling at St Mary's College. He read English at University College London (1959-62), specialised in English language studies, did some research there at the Survey of English Usage under Randolph Quirk (1962-3), then joined academic life as a lecturer in linguistics, first at Bangor, then at Reading. He published the first of his 100 or so books in 1964, and became known chiefly for his research work in English language studies, in such fields as intonation and stylistics, and in the application of linguistics to religious, educational and clinical contexts, notably in the development of a range of linguistic profiling techniques for diagnostic and therapeutic purposes. He held a chair at the University of Reading for 10 years, and is now Honorary Professor of Linguistics at the University of Wales, Bangor. These days he divides his time between work on language and work on internet applications.

内容简介

The world's foremost expert on the English language takes us on an entertaining and eye-opening tour of the history of our vernacular through the ages.

In this entertaining history of the world's most ubiquitous language, David Crystal draws on one hundred words that best illustrate the huge variety of sources, influences and events that have helped to shape our vernacular since the first definitively English word--'roe'--was written down on the femur of a roe deer in the fifth century. Featuring ancient words ('loaf'), cutting edge terms that relfect our world ('twittersphere'), indispensible words that shape our tongue ('and', 'what'), fanciful words ('fopdoodle') and even obscene expressions (the "c word..".), David Crystal takes readers on a tour of the winding byways of our language via the rude, the obscure and the downright surprising.


David Crystal works from his home in Holyhead, North Wales, as a writer, editor, lecturer, and broadcaster. Born in Lisburn, Northern Ireland in 1941, he spent his early years in Holyhead. His family moved to Liverpool in 1951, and he received his secondary schooling at St Mary's College. He read English at University College London (1959-62), specialised in English language st...

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豆瓣评论

  • Miss Coconut
    真正的语言大师写词源都妙趣横生!!继On Writing Well 之后近期读到的第二本让我倾倒不已的英语语言写作类书籍。做为睡前读物,实在是太合适了,可以随时拿起随时放下!一共100章,一章讲一个(类)词,对英语作为一门语言有了更深的了解,甚至融会贯通地对汉语也更理解了,大力推荐!"When we explore the history of words, we find a window into society". PS 有很多各国词汇对比的,深深感叹我已经完全是美式英语了。05-23
  • bigjingjing
    "When we explore the history of words, we find a window into society".03-21
  • marego
    按作者的说法,这是一本既有树木,又见森林的书。对此,俺表示同意。07-26
  • 方若
    100节,每节讲一个英语单词的起源和发展。有点“说文解字”的感觉。本以为会有很多阅读收获,但实际并不多。所以读了3节就停止了。07-05
  • LaoBai
    信息量巨大。作者开篇就吹嘘本书对于英国语言历史而言,要让读者既见森林又见树木。我逛了一圈,估计只带走几片叶子......05-25

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