The Mother Tongue

Rating:
Summary: Fascinating history of English
Review: Mother Tongue contains so much information that you have to read it slowly or you'll miss most of it. Despite its relatively short length, a very large range of topics are covered, and while none of them are covered in the sort of depth that a scholar of the language would desire, the coverage is just the right amount so that no chapter becomes tedious.

There may be some minor errors here, or some possibly inaccurate generalizations, but on the whole, I think that Bryson has done his research, and since he lists sources, the reader is free to verify anything they disagree with.

Some reviewers have called this a funny book. While it is highly enjoyable, and amusing in places, it is not the sort of book that will have you laughing out loud. I think this is a good thing, since it indicates that Bryson is not trying to score cheap laughs at the expense of the language (he does in fact do this on the odd occasion, but when he does, it's well deserved).

This book has taught me more about the English language than all of my years of schooling, and I think that this book should be read by everyone, but students in particular will probably save themselves a lot of grief by reading this. I would be curious to see what people who speak English as a second language think of this book, since I believe it would be quite helpful to them.

Rating:
Summary: Carnival barker at the theater of language
Review: Perhaps riddled with error and contradictions in logic, Bryson's book nonetheless is an amiable romp through the history of the English language for we (us?) non-philologists (philolophobes?). Bryson is first and foremost a humorist, a social commentator, and his work should be read as a the work of a dilettante. He ain't no professer of linguistiks!

Bryson does do an admirable job of introducing all the pit-and pratfalls associated with the language, and I, for one, was absolutely stunned by the swiftness and extent of change that occurs constantly in our English, as portrayed by the author. I laughed at some - not many - of his jokes. Ultimately, it's not the humor that's this book's strong point, it's the protagonist, the hero of this drama, the English language that steals the show. Bryson is the carnie, the man who calls out to us and troops us by the freaks and geeks - the oddities of spelling and grammar, perhaps? - and we walk about the chaotic, disorganized spectacle, taking it all in.

So if you're curious about English, check out this book. If you're looking for strong research material, move along!

Rating:
Summary: Preaching to the choir
Review: I enjoyed this myself but I think the readership for this must mainly be people who are already interested in languages. It has rather a lot about such things as vowel shifts in English between fourteen hundred and fourteen fifty. To convert someone into a Bill Bryson addict I would turn them on with one of the travel books. One thing that carries over from his other books is the British/American comparison. He is a mine of information and insights about this. It's also the only language book I've read that fully covers the dirty words and cuss words.
I don't know how the experts feel about its accuracy. I note that he describes William Jones as English. His nationality is relevant because the fact that he was a Welsh speaker was one of the things that enabled him to recognize the relationships between the Indo-European languages. On that subject I take issue with Bryson's implied endorsement of the Economist's criticism of subsidizing Welsh. If you really want to eliminate useless relics of pre-Saxon Britain why not start with say Stonehenge. You could probably save the taxpayers millions of pounds. by bulldozing the place, putting a useful road through, and selling Salisbury Plain off to developers.
I don't know about the alleged thirty Inuit words for snow. I've seen that one debunked and confirmed. Maybe Inuit in Alaska have diffrent words from ones in East Greenland.

Rating:
Summary: Author Appreciates the Texture and Whimsy of English
Review: This is a fun book.

Author Bill Bryson is best known for his travelogues. This book is an eclectic survey of the English language: its origins, evolution, borrowings from other languages, pronunciation and more. Through the book, Bryson's trademark humor is present. Although this book has less laughs per page than "A Walk in the Woods," it features Bryson's wonderful wit and leaves out the sarcasm that made some of his earlier efforts less than par.

Bryson clearly loves and respects the power of English. Perhaps alone among major languages, English developed without official sanction in the fields and streets of early medieval England, where the court spoke Norman French. Looked down upon, it was free to flourish and find expression for how most people really lived their lives.

This lack of officialdom during its birth and early rearing left us with wacky spelling and a few other eccentricities. But it also greatly simplified the language by, for example, eliminating the masculine and feminine articles inherent in French and the large number of verb forms associated with other descendents of Latin.

It also picked up more words and thus maintains a larger vocabulary than its European rivals, according to the author. This has given English the ability to richly texture speech and writings and provide a sublime ability to distinguish expression and thought more so than one is able to do in many other languages.

This is not a textbook, although it does pack a lot of serious information and linguistic discussions of the technical aspects of language. In a few chapters, Bryson relies too much on long lists to show his examples. This wears only a little and is buffeted by his humor throughout. Particularly interesting and enjoyable are his discourses on swearing, word games and improbable place names (like Maggies' Nipples, a town in Wyoming and Coldass Creek, located in North Carolina).

This book is very enjoyable and informative.

Rating:
Summary: Interesting Book with a Ton of Wrong Information
Review: The Mother Tongue was the first major book on language I ever read. I must say, I found it highly enjoyable and very interesting at the time, and I found it very informative as well. However, after I returned to the book lately, with a great deal more linguistic knowledge than I possessed before, though I am not by any means an expert, I found myself astonished by what I was reading. This is a book in desperate need for an editor with a sharp eye for facts, because although some parts of the book are correct, far too much of it is just misinformation.
The easiest thing for anyone even slightly versed in a foreign language to catch is Bill Bryson's complete lack of knowledge on foreign pronounciation. He makes such claims as that German people cannot pronounce v's when infact v is a common sound in the German language, claims the Danish name for Copenhagen, Købnhavn is pronounced Kohbenhawen (when in fact its pronounced Köbenhahven, with a German o umlaut), among other things. He also appears to lack any serious knowledge of Archaic English pronounciation, claiming such things as that Chaucer pronounced a double o as in food. He also lacks understanding as to the arising of pairs like knife knives and grass graze, when any person who has studied Middle English in any detail can tell you they come originally from voicing sounds between vowels (knif, knives, gras, grazen). He also claims as that damp, a word with ancient Germanic roots, was coined in the 17th century. In short, he appears to possess next to no real knowledge on the subject of English language history, or foreign, for that matter.
Less trival for someone writing on language is his lack of understanding in the area of verb conjugation and form. He makes the claim that I am driving is in the present tense, when any language student can tell him that I am driving is an auxillary tense utilizing the present participle of drive. Similarly his claim that the form drive as present tense is found in to drive, would drive, will drive, is absurd. to drive is an infinitive, would drive a past subjunctive, and will drive a future. They all use auxillaries, something Mr. Bryson was apparently not informed about during his research for this book.
The author also shows an amazing lack of common sense at points, claiming that -gry in angry and hungry is a sufix, when anyone can see that it's a contracted form of hungery and angery, thus the sufix is not -gry but the extremely common -y.
The book does have its good points. (...)
In short, this book must be read with a grain of salt. Any serious language student will find himself in disagreement with it often on technical details, in which he will be himself in the right. However, these errors do not totally outway the book as a whole, and so it should be a welcome introduction to any library.

Rating:
Summary: a fun and funny book
Review: To me, The Mother Tongue (English & How it Got that Way), rates 4 stars simply because it is a very quick and funny read. Bill Bryson is better-known as a travel writer than a linguist because, logically enough, he is not a professional linguist. As many others in this forum have attested, you should not take this book as an example of up-to-date scholarship on the subject of the evolution of English or any other language. And I don't think Bryson intended it to be taken that way. If Bryson is a bit of an overenthusiastic fan of English and language in general, that does not mean that you cannot profit from this work and I think you would have to be a rather narrow-minded purist to find it unenjoyable.

The book is less of a history of English than a hodge-podge of interesting and sometimes funny facts and anecdotes about various elements of English and wordplay in it. He addresses the prevalence of English around the world and how it is changed by each culture to address their own needs, some theories on how language began, the infinite and provincial varieties of the pronunciation of English and some other languages, the institution of standardized spelling, the differences between American and King's English, the history of cataloguing words, swearing, and word-games.

He misses some good anecdotes along the way, such as President Andrew Jackson's line "What kind of moron can think of only one way to spell a word." (more or less) and, contra Bryson, I think the closest America has come to the clerihew is the double dactyl invented by John Hollander and Anthony Hecht, as in:

"Higgeldy-piggeldy,
Benjamin Harrison,
Twenty-third president,
Was, and, as such,

Served between Clevelands, and
Save for this trivial
Idiosyncracy,
Didn't do much."

But on the whole, I learned quite a bit, like that the court language in London was a provincial French, which had many differences from the Parisian French which modern French descends from. Logical though it seems upon reflection, I had never noticed that Chinese, having a non-phonetic alphabet, has no simple way to order their dictionaries. This also means that they don't have the pleasure of crossword puzzles although they have word games we could never replicate in English. I had never considered that there was any possibility to try and intelligently guess at how languages were pronounced before audio recordings. Bryson tells us how the professionals go about making those guesses -- and it doesn't seem as unreasonable as I had previously thought.

On the other hand, there are some factual errors you should be aware of. These include the lack of thesauri in other languages (I believe they were invented in English and writers in other languages don't make much use of them, but all the same), the myth that the Eskimos have 50 words for snow, that Finnish has no swear words, and you might take a look at the other reviews in this forum to check for other errors that Bryson makes or repeats. I would add that although Bryson points out that languages without phonetic alphabets have no ways of ordering dictionaries, he includes Japanese as such a language, although he later notes that Japanese has an ancient phonetic alphabet, kanji. Well, this leaves you wondering whether they had alphabetic dictionaries or thesauri earlier and, if not, when and why, exactly, were they introduced?

These shortcomings notwithstanding, The Mother Tongue is a very fun book and I believe non-specialists would profit handsomely from giving it a read -- I certainly feel as if I have.

Rating:
Summary: Bryson's trip of the Tongue.
Review: Before writing about his attempt to hike the 2,100-mile Appalachian Trail in A WALK IN THE WOODS, and then describing his journey through the scientific universe in his more recent A SHORT HISTORY OF NEARLY EVERYTHING, Bill Bryson took an encyclopedic trip through the history of the English language, from man's first Neanderthal grunt 30,000 years ago, to the language as we now know it. As Shakespeare was inventing words like "critical," "leapfrog," "majestic," "obscene," "frugal," "radiance," "excellent," "gust," "hint," "hurry," "lonely," "summit," and "monumental," words which had never been used before, a British scholar was predicting that "the English tongue" was of "small account, stetching no further than this island of ours." Neither writer probably had any idea that the English language would someday evolve into the predominant language of the world (p. 66). In his book, Bryson retraces that fascinating evolution through fascinating chapters on pronunciation, spelling, usage, swearing, and wordplay, revealing along the way that "one of the undoubted virtues of English is that it is a fluid and democratic language in which meanings shift and change in response to presssures of common usage rather than the dictates of committees" (p. 145).

This book is characteristic Bryson, and Bryson fans won't be disappointed. I especially enjoyed this book, but then again I'm biased. I must confess English has always been one of my favorite subjects. (My undergraduate degree was in English, and I studied linguistics and rhetoric in grad school, while simultaneously devouring all the Victorian novels.) Other readers may find reading Bryson's book about as much fun as diagraming sentences. Still other more academic readers may find it a bit of a scholarly disappointment. But, written with Bryson's distinctive wit and plenty of entertaining anecdotes, it will nevertheless appeal to a general audience of readers, rewarding them with a greater appreciation of the language in all of its idiosyncratic forms.

G. Merritt

Rating:
Summary: Bryson's Brilliance
Review: Clearly Bill Bryson knew what he was doing when he wrote this book, The Mother Tongue. He uses his sense of humor and rather witty personality to incorporate in depth looks at how our English system works. Not only does he discuss everything from where words come from to swearing and word playing, he discusses them in a manner that hits all three areas, past, present and futuristic terms. Although it would rather fit for this book to be updated for it in this day and age is a little outdated. Although with the brilliance behind Bill Bryson, he covered some what of the futuristic aspect although it seems rather in the present. I would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in finding a book with a witty author and a great intellectual outlook.

Rating:
Summary: Knowing, entertaining, just a tad dated
Review: When Bill Bryson doesn't have anything else to do (yeah, right), he might want to consider issuing a revised edition of this entertaining but somewhat dated book. As he so ably points out, language is protean and much has changed in the last 15 years since he worked on this. In addition to new research and revelations that might correct or amend the text, there is the incomparable affect of the internet that has arisen since this book saw the light, not to mention the "business speak" that corporate culture has been slipping in of late.

That said, there is much to be gained by reading this book. Bryson's wonder and delight in the English language is contagious. While some of the historical information may be familiar at first, especially if you, like him, have read McCrum's THE STORY OF ENGLISH, his sorting out of the origins of our language and historical forces is quite lucid and thorough refresher course. What I especially appreciated was his look at how American and English usage and pronunciation diverged. I did not realize that the plummy "ah" sound that Americans identify so strongly with the British accent, as in glahss and cahn't, only came about in the 18th century, a social fashion that survived. I've come away with a better understanding of the role of how geographic movement and isolation affects language, as well as the very human need to name everything in site.

A note to recently indoctrinated Bryson fans: this was written rather early in his book career, in his English mode. Keep in mind that he only got better and funnier, though there is a sharp intelligence, graceful voice and sly wit behind every sentence of this book.

Rating:
Summary: Nobrainerbuythisgoodbooktourdeforce.
Review: I got the inspiration for my book review title from the German word "bundesbahnangestelltenwitwe" (window of a federal railway employee) one of the many words discussed in this mini-tour-de-force all too short 270 page book. I hope it does not trigger a headache!

I first came across Bill Bryson's books quite by accident. I was in an airport bookstore in Australia and they had large piles of his book with a bright yellow and blue book covers that were quite literally selling like hot cakes. That was his book "Down Under" about Australia and it was actually very popular in that country. I bought the book and read it on the flight home and finished a day or two later. Since then I have been hooked on his books. He employs a combination of knowledge, good stories, excellent writing, and humor. I have tried to buy and read all of his books, but still have a few to read.

The present book is a quick and an all too short introduction to all aspects of the language presented in a humorous way in a series of short chapters - each being an introduction to the topic. One can actually pick up the book and read just one chapter at random since each chapter is a self contained short story on that particular aspect of the language including "Names", "Spelling", "Where Words Come From", etc. It is all very interesting, entertaining, and illuminating.

It gives an introduction to the origins, the evolution of words and language, pronunciation, spelling, and transoceanic evolution of the language - all written at the level of the average reader. He presents many coincidences in words and phrases from different parts of the world and ages that one cannot logically connect, but seem to have common language threads, and even specific words.

The book is a nice but too short introduction to the subject. It includes a nice collection of follow up books to consider in an attached Bibliography. There the reader can continue the subject at their leisure reading more academic or comprehensive books.

For the uninitiated, once you read this book you will not view speaking in the same way. He brings us many new insights. If this or similar books were available to school students, maybe students would have a greater love of languages.

I would have liked to see a longer book than 250 pages plus references and that is the main weakness. Also there might be some minor errors. So I feel it probably deserves 3 or 4 stars. But I am giving it 4 stars because he has written a very easy to read introduction to a complex and possibly otherwise dull subject and at the same time created a best seller. Anyone can read and enjoy this book. To create such a book is a difficult challenge that he has conquered with ease.

Even though I rate it 4 stars (and it is not Bryson's best) it is strongly recommended to buy. It is a "gateway" book that will lead the reader to new and interesting books.

Jack in Toronto