The Adventure of English: The Biography of a Language

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Автор: Bragg Melvyn

Название: The Adventure of English: The Biography of a Language

Издательство: Arcade Publishing

Год: 2011

Формат: PDF

Размер: 82 Мб

Язык: Английский

Страниц: 322

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An excellent complement to the audiobook and the series. Here is the riveting story of the English language, from its humble beginnings as a regional dialect to its current preeminence as the one global language, spoken by more than two billion people worldwide. In this groundbreaking book, Melvyn Bragg shows how English conquered the world.

CONTENTS

Introduction ix

1 The Common Tongue 1

2 The Great Escape 16

3 Conquest 32

4 Holding On 40

5 The Speech of Kings 52

6 Chaucer 66

7 God’s English 76

8 English and the Language of the State 89

9 William Tyndale’s Bible 99

10 A Renaissance of Words 109

11 Preparing the Ground 121

12 Shakespeare’s English 132

13 My America 144

14 Wild West Words 161

15 Sold Down the River 176

16 Mastering the Language 188

17 The Proper Way to Talk 207

18 Steam, Streets and Slang 224

19 Indian Takeover 236

20 The West Indies 251

21 Advance Australia 261

22 Warts and All 272

23 All Over the World 281

24 And Now.? 290

Acknowledgments 297

Picture Acknowledgments 301

Bibliography 303

Index 313

Photographs follow pages 82, 130, 178, and 226