The Mother Tongue: English and How It Got That Way

By: Bill Bryson

Published September 28th 1991 by William Morrow Paperbacks (first published 1990)

Category: Arts

Pages: 270 pages

ISBN: 9780380715435

Description:
With dazzling wit and astonishing insight, Bill Bryson—the acclaimed author of The Lost Continent—brilliantly explores the remarkable history, eccentricities, resilience and sheer fun of the English language. From the first descent of the larynx into the throat (why you can talk but your dog can't), to the fine lost art of swearing, Bryson tells the fascinating, often uproarious story of an inadequate, second-rate tongue of peasants that developed into one of the world's largest growth industries.