The Mother Tongue by Bill Bryson

The Mother Tongue by Bill Bryson

"Vastly informative and vastly entertaining...A scholarly and fascinating book." --Los Angeles Times

With dazzling wit and astonishing insight, Bill Bryson 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.

A Walk in the Woods (now a blockbuster feature picture starring Robert Redford and Nick Nolte), Notes from a Small Island, I'm a Stranger Here Myself, In a Sunburned Land, A Brief History of Virtually Everything (which won him the 2004 Aventis Award), The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid, At Home, and One Summer are among Bill Bryson's best-selling works. He and his wife live in England. Bill Bryson's website is www.billbrysonbooks.com.