Book Review: The Etymologicon
There are not enough words to express my gratitude towards Mark Forsyth for writing this wonderful book. If The Horologicon dealt with the long-lost words of the English language, its prequel The Etymologicon is all about the day-to-day words used in common parlance and their amusing origins. Forsyth's sense of humour is on full show as he takes the reader on 'A Circular Stroll through the Hidden Connections of the English Language': a stroll that will reveal the interesting history behind the words that we use today.
Did you know that "Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo" is the longest grammatically correct sentence in English that uses only one word? Or that the word "gun" is named after a certain Queen Gunhilda? And it goes on and on and on... The evolution of spoken dialect is as fascinating as the evolution of Man himself. Just as our ancestors began to disperse and settle in different corners of the Earth, they invented new forms of language along the way.
English, thus, has assimilated (or rather borrowed) its vocabulary from an array of different languages like Latin, Greek, French, German, Sanskrit (and by extension Hindi) and several others. There are no hard and fast rules governing its origins, and suffice to say, there are exceptions and corruptions all throughout. Tracing the history of words, as you would have understood, is no easy task, and Forsyth goes about this by adopting a conversational style that's engrossing, funny and eventually a great learning experience.
Each chapter begins with the origin of a specific word (or phrase) that sets the scene for what's to follow next. He then proceeds to explore other words that share the same or similar roots, with the final word becoming the opening word for the next chapter. The stroll thus proceeds unabated in this fashion until the last chapter closes the loop by getting back to the word discussed at the start of the book. This master-stroke of structuring the content is what makes the circular stroll so enjoyable that I wouldn't slightly hesitate to take it all over again. This is etymology at its best. Oh, by the way, you can follow Mark Forsyth at his Inky Fool blog.
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| The Etymologicon |
English, thus, has assimilated (or rather borrowed) its vocabulary from an array of different languages like Latin, Greek, French, German, Sanskrit (and by extension Hindi) and several others. There are no hard and fast rules governing its origins, and suffice to say, there are exceptions and corruptions all throughout. Tracing the history of words, as you would have understood, is no easy task, and Forsyth goes about this by adopting a conversational style that's engrossing, funny and eventually a great learning experience.
Each chapter begins with the origin of a specific word (or phrase) that sets the scene for what's to follow next. He then proceeds to explore other words that share the same or similar roots, with the final word becoming the opening word for the next chapter. The stroll thus proceeds unabated in this fashion until the last chapter closes the loop by getting back to the word discussed at the start of the book. This master-stroke of structuring the content is what makes the circular stroll so enjoyable that I wouldn't slightly hesitate to take it all over again. This is etymology at its best. Oh, by the way, you can follow Mark Forsyth at his Inky Fool blog.
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