Transcendental Wordplay: America's Romantic Punsters and the Search for the Language of Nature

Rating:
Summary: Punning in the 19th century - what it's all about
Review: This book is wondrous. For openers, it is written so well that it is a marvel of English usage and will shame most of us that think we know the language. Secondly, it strikes a marvelous balance between pedagogy - for fundamentally this is a serious scholastic work - and the delight that the author takes in his subject.

Dealing with Thoreau to great degree, it shows how punning was a significant part of romantic literature, and should not be dealt with contempt, but rather as a serious and significant part of our literary heritage.

Plus the humor in both the the subject matter and Professor West's treatment thereof are incomparable. Highly recommended to both the scholar and the interested dilletante atracted to our language and its associated history.

Rating:
Summary: Punning in the 19th century - what it's all about
Review: This book is wondrous. For openers, it is written so well that it is a marvel of English usage and will shame most of us that think we know the language. Secondly, it strikes a marvelous balance between pedagogy - for fundamentally this is a serious scholastic work - and the delight that the author takes in his subject.

Dealing with Thoreau to great degree, it shows how punning was a significant part of romantic literature, and should not be dealt with contempt, but rather as a serious and significant part of our literary heritage.

Plus the humor in both the the subject matter and Professor West's treatment thereof are incomparable. Highly recommended to both the scholar and the interested dilletante atracted to our language and its associated history.