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A waspish review of the massacre of the Queen's English, introduced by Britain's best-loved radio journalist John Humphrys.Here is a new, enlarged edition of the book described by The Independent as a "cool, disdainfully precise A-Z of linguistic misuse", and by its author as "a two-hour course in language detoxification". Included as an appendix for the first time is George Orwell's 1946 essay Politics and the English Language, which brilliantly analyses the way in which lazy or dishonest language can displace thought and subvert meaning.Between You and I is mostly about Bad English in the Orwellian sense. Much of what is included here is 'half-educated' language used by people in the mistaken belief that speaking or writing in their natural idiom is somehow less 'correct'. Most of the examples come from people who should be setting a good example: from public figures, from those in the media and politics, from teachers and university academics. It is a sad paradox that while our language is constantly being enriched from below it is all too often being impoverished from above.Fortunately, although the situation has probably deteriorated since the first edition, it's not too late for the worst examples of Bad English to be recognised and remedied. This concise book takes the reader through a veritable rogues' gallery of misguided language with that hope in mind. Many readers may be surprised to find that much of what they thought was 'bad' English is in fact perfectly good, and that what they have been led to think of as 'good' English is sometimes ignorant, dishonest or plain stupid.… (more)
User reviews
Yes, I will admit that I discovered many of these errors to be ones I commit with alarming regularity. In fact, I've probably committed a few of them in writing this review as much as I try not to. I was also delighted when I came across entries of errors and words I already knew about.
Another interesting thing about this book was its incontrovertibly British stand point (despite his being Scottish) and I enjoyed the references and not so subtle jabs. Although Mr. Cochrane would probably weep despondently should he ever have an opportunity to converse with me or read anything I've ever written, I will say I enjoyed his book and plan to hang on to it for future reference purposes.
Nice fun!
The book is not pleasant to read straight through, as I soon found out, but taken in short segments, such as on break at work, it is more palatable.
Some of these common errors were well known to me, but I was horrified to learn how many I'd been going about using improperly for some time. However, I'm not sure this was entirely positive, as I am now more of a grammar nazi than I already was!
Drawn from columns in The Times, fulminations on incorrect usage, etc. While the previous book is flexible and accepting of change, this one is a little reactionary, although it does claim to understand about descriptive rather than prescriptive description of language. Many of