No Idle Words
Condition: SECONDHAND
This is a secondhand book. The jacket image is a photograph of the exact copy we have in stock. This image shows the condition of this book. Further condition remarks are below.
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: No dust jacket - some marks on spine and corners
Pages: Tanning and foxing
Language is alive — it breathes, shifts, and surprises — and few writers have championed its vitality with more wit and warmth than Ivor Brown. No Idle Words is a celebration of the English language in all its richness, tracing the origins, quirks, and hidden histories of the words we use every day, presenting an erudite yet thoroughly entertaining tour through the English lexicon that will delight anyone who has ever paused to wonder why we say what we say. Brown, a celebrated journalist, dramatist, and wordsmith of the mid-twentieth century, writes with the ease of a man utterly at home in the English language, blending scholarship with a light, conversational grace that makes even the most intricate etymological argument feel like a pleasure. His essays argue that no word is truly idle — each carries centuries of human experience within it — and this conviction animates every page with infectious curiosity. For lovers of language, literature, and the art of expression, this volume remains an enduring testament to the power of paying close attention to the words we so casually inherit.
Author: Ivor Brown
Format: Hardback
Published: 1948, Jonathan Cape
Genre: Essays
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: No dust jacket - some marks on spine and corners
Pages: Tanning and foxing
Language is alive — it breathes, shifts, and surprises — and few writers have championed its vitality with more wit and warmth than Ivor Brown. No Idle Words is a celebration of the English language in all its richness, tracing the origins, quirks, and hidden histories of the words we use every day, presenting an erudite yet thoroughly entertaining tour through the English lexicon that will delight anyone who has ever paused to wonder why we say what we say. Brown, a celebrated journalist, dramatist, and wordsmith of the mid-twentieth century, writes with the ease of a man utterly at home in the English language, blending scholarship with a light, conversational grace that makes even the most intricate etymological argument feel like a pleasure. His essays argue that no word is truly idle — each carries centuries of human experience within it — and this conviction animates every page with infectious curiosity. For lovers of language, literature, and the art of expression, this volume remains an enduring testament to the power of paying close attention to the words we so casually inherit.