English language Category
Praise and insults
Evidently there are far more British words for insulting people than there are for praising them, probably…
Harold Pinter
Londoner Harold Pinter (1930-2008), writer for stage, screen and print, actor and director, was awarded the 2005…
Received Pronunciation
The relatively modern concept of ‘standard English’ has become known as Received Pronunciation (RP) or even ‘BBC…
P.G. Wodehouse
Sir P.G. (Pelham Grenville, nicknamed ‘Plum’) Wodehouse (1881-1975), from Surrey, became one of Britain’s best-loved and most…
British dialects
At the time of WW2 there were at least 50 distinct British dialects, some with derived names…
The Booker Prize
In 1967 Lord Jock Campbell (1912-94) from Dunbartonshire was about to head the development of the new…
Middle English
In the period immediately following the Norman Conquest of 1066, there were three main languages spoken in…
Food words
We mainly have the French to thank for many of our food words (like omelette and mustard),…
Rudyard Kipling
Joseph Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936) was born in ‘British India’, a place he loved, settled awhile in the…
Lord Byron
Lord Byron (George Gordon, 1788-1824) gave English literature the ‘Byronic hero’, seen in the novels of the…
Tyndale’s New Testament
William Tyndale (c.1491-1536) from Gloucestershire was a martyr to the English language in his self-appointed though ultimately…
William Blake, author of ‘Jerusalem’
In his time, William Blake (1757-1827) was viewed by some as a nutcase. It was not until…