Language
We’ve been saying ‘wrap up warm’ for a thousand years
In June 1873, Oswald Cockayne shot himself. He was in a state of melancholy, having been dismissed by King’s College…
Why do so many academics write so badly?
Why do so many academics write so badly? Those who make the study of language their life’s work are as…
Boo
In 1872, the 27-stone figure of the Tichborne Claimant was insisting he was Sir Roger Tichborne Bt, an heir thought…
Bacteria
It’s like whipping cream. All of a sudden it goes stiff and you can turn the bowl upside down without…
Mechanistic insight
No, hang on, don’t turn to Dear Mary yet. This is not as dull as it sounds. It’s just that…
Epiphanic
‘I love the pumping station,’ said my husband, waving a copy of the Docklands and East London Advertiser which reported…
Concept
‘It was nothing special, but it was a pub,’ said my husband, looking up from his copy of Bar magazine…
Exclamation marks
‘Like eating in the street,’ said my husband. Astonishing! He’d said something not only coherent in itself but also connected…
Sadiq Khan’s virtues
The new Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, said he wanted ‘the most transparent, honest and accessible administration London has ever…
Shakespeare’s pronunciation
Sir John Harington told a story in 1596 about a lady at court asking her gentlewoman to inquire which Mr…
Illegitimate
‘The Archbishop of Canterbury has discovered he is the illegitimate son of Sir Winston Churchill’s last private secretary,’ Charles Moore…
Gender fluid
Benjamin Franklin thought that an excess of electric fluid gave rise to positive electricity, and a deficiency of the fluid…
Special status
‘Special status?’ said my husband. ‘You mean like executioners, butchers and undertakers in Japan?’ I hadn’t suggested that, but had…
Creaky voice
My husband, not surprisingly, finds it extremely annoying. It, in this instance, is the use by women of creaky voice.…
Beware
My husband pointed with his stick, which he carries not to steady himself but to cudgel pedestrians out of his…
Not even a thing
Last summer Kim Kardashian, who already had a daughter called North (surname West), announced that she was expecting a boy.…
Peak
Near Victoria Station in London they began to build a tower-block advertised as ‘The Peak’. I expected it to resemble…
Chattering classes
When the much missed Frank Johnson (1943–2006), once editor of The Spectator, wrote in 1980 that ‘the peculiar need for…
Mind your language . . . on commit
My husband struck out with his stick at an advertisement in the street that said: ‘Commit to winter.’ He doesn’t…
‘They pull a gun, you pull a hashtag’ – the ridiculous debate over what to call Isil
We should worry less about what to call Isis, and more about how to fight them
The rise of the man bun, the Mancan and man boobs
‘Ha, ha, ha,’ said my husband, as though he had learnt to laugh by reading Twitter. ‘Now they’ve got falsies.’ He…
Is ‘female’ still an insult?
‘More deadly than the male,’ said my husband archly. He was knowingly quoting Kipling, though I don’t know why he…
How we ended up ‘cisgender’
‘That’s not how you spell “system”,’ said my husband triumphantly, pointing with his whisky glass at a placard inveighing against…
Diary
I’m counting ‘Wows!’ Suddenly everyone is using this irritating expletive expressing incredulity, amazement and nothing at all. I’ve heard it…
Fulsome
It’s funny that two much misused words end in —some: fulsome and noisome. Noisome is the less often used at…
