The Story of English in 100 Words

Very clever. Crystal uses each word as a starting point for a brief discussion on the ways our language has changed and developed over the centuries, reminding us all of the idiocy of such movements as "language reform", and of the joy we should feel every time we piece together a sentence. We're not just using a language. We're working with a breathing mass of orphans, stragglers, immigrants, and naturalised citizens from so many languages and cultures, now working together in an often unstable and cacophonic new world. And I love it.

This was a delight. Linguist David Crystal's word book of one hundred English words does a great job of exploring and explaining the history of English and how words change and get added to the language. He read it wonderfully, and his light Welsh accent contributed to its feeling like he was telling me a story. Recommended, especially on audio.

I'm a word nerd, so I found this book very interesting and very accessible. After very short historical explanation of how the English language came to be. "...English is a vacuum cleaner of a language, whose users suck in words from other languages whenever they encounter them." Crystal has chosen 100 words to examine and analyze, looking at their contribution the language as a whole. Each word has a brief explanation, that is humorously and thoughtfully written. Examples: roe -- 5th century -- 1st written English word, identifiable as such. It was carved on a deer bone -- naming it as from a certain species. Some other fun examples: bone-house, a word painting (kenning) from the 10th century to mean the human body. "cuckoo" -- 13th show more century -- a word that describes a sound (onomatopoeia) more than the creature; Watergate -- the use of a place name (toponym) as a noun or verb; strine -- a word coined for comic effect, usually playing off its pronunciation, more than its actual spelling. (e.g. "ickle, = little sly drool = slide rule). The most important word of the 20th century? "jazz." If this book doesn't help you win Jeopardy or Trivial Pursuit, nothing will. show less

A quick romp through the history of our language, including word borrowing, spelling evolutions, grammar trivia, British vs. American vs. Every one else's English, eponyms, and everything else to remind us that the English language is not stagnant. Crystal's writing style is densely informative without being dry. Each sentence adds a new little tidbit of information, his illustrative stories never seem tacked on or forced, and humor is used just enough for good laughs without cheapening his work.

A fascinating and readable account of how the English language developed. Expect more than 100 Words - while each section is ostensibly about a particular word, this is just a stalking horse. There can be a dozen or more related words explained in the section.

As you might expect, this book selects 100 words from the English language as a way of telling the story of its development. I like Crystal’s writing and the setup of this book (every choice of word made sense), but I found the chapters almost too short, and some of the stories I’d heard before (like grammar/glamour and the inkhorn terms). So I would recommend this more for someone who hasn’t read too many word-origin books. And for anyone trying Crystal for the first time, they could certainly read this one, but I’d also suggest Making a Point, which is about punctuation and has longer chapters to indulge in.

Entertaining and erudite discussion of the history of 100 English words. Very good on American vs Britishisms and much related interesting history - early American history under "skunk", the peculiar addition of the letter b to "debt" in the 16th century, the various theories for the origin of "OK",etc. One quibble - under Yiddishisms he mentions the expression Joe Schmoe, but does not state what Schmoe is a euphemism for.