图书简介

What the Hell, English? ; The Colonel of Truth: What is the deal with the word colonel? ; Fairweather Vowels: Why is y a sometimes vowel? ; Hey Large Spender: Why do we order a large drink and not a big one? ; Crazy English: Why do we drive on a parkway and park on a driveway? ; What the Hell is with What the Hell? ; Blame the Barbarians ; Thoroughly Tough, Right?: Why don’t tough, through, and dough rhyme? ; Getting and Giving the General Gist: Why are there two ways to say the letter g? ; Egging them On: What is the egg doing in egg on? ; I Ated All the Cookies: Why do we have irregular verbs? ; It Goes by so Fastly: Why do we move slowly but not fastly? And step softly but not hardly? ; Elegantly Clad and Stylishly Shod: Why is it clean-shaven and not clean-shaved? ; Six of One, Half a Twoteen of the Other: Why is it eleven, twelve instead of oneteen, twoteen? ; Woe is We: Why is it woe is me, not I am woe? ; Blame the French ; A Sizeable, Substantial, Extensive Vocabulary: Why are there so many synonyms? ; Don’t inSULT me with that INsult: Why are there noun-verb pairs that only differ by stress? ; Without Fail: Why is it without fail and not failure or failing? ; Ask the Poets Laureate: Why is it sum total and not total sum? ; Of Unrequited Lof: Why isn’t of spelled with a v? ; Blame the Printing Press ; Uninvited Ghuests: Why are ghost, ghastly, and ghoul spelled with a gh? ; Gnat, Knot, Comb, Wrist: Why do we have silent consonants? ; Coulda, Shoulda, Woulda: Why is there a silent l? ; Peek, Peak, Piece, People: Why are there so many ways to write the ’ee’ sound? ; Crew, Grew, Stew, New...Sew?: Why don’t sew and new rhyme? ; Blame the snobs ; Get Receipts on those Extra Letters: Why is there a p in receipt, an l in salmon, and a b in doubt? ; Asthma, Phelgm, and Diarrhea: Why all the extra letters? ; The Data are in on the Octopi: What’s the deal with Latin plurals? ; Too Much Discretion: Keeping discreet and discrete discrete, discreetly ; Pick a Color/Colour: Can’t we get this standardized/standardised? ; Blame ourselves ; Couth, Kempt, and Ruthful: Why have some words lost their better halves? ; If it Ain’t Broke, Don’t Scramble It: Why is There no egg in eggplant? ; Proving the Rule: How can an exception prove a rule? ; How Dare You Say How Try You!: Why dare isn’t like the other verbs ; Release the Meese: Why isn’t the plural of moose meese? ; Why do Noses Run and Feet Smell?: A corny joke with a serious answer ; Negative Fixation: Why can you say this won’t take long but not this will take long? ; Abbreviation Deflation: Why is there an r in Mrs.? ; How it Comes to Be: How come we say how come? ; Phrasal Verbs, Let’s Go Over Them: But don’t try to go them over. (You can look them over though) ; Terrible and Terrific, Awful and Awesome: How does the same root get opposite meanings? ; Literally Messed Up: How did literally get to mean figuratively? ; That’s Enough, Now, English ; Acknowledgments ; Notes ; Bibliography

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