William Brohaugh

The book starts with a simple premise: Everything you know about English is wrong. The book is split up into sections explaining why everything you thought you knew about English is wrong.

Well, not everything, it's mostly about rumours floating around on Internet message boards about the etymology of words, such as "bullshit" and "bull" are not really etymologically related, "fuck" is not "fornication under consent of the king", and "shit" is not "ship high in transit".

The book also talks about the changing meaning of words, and tells "persnicketers" that if they are upset with a new meaning of a word, they should make sure to always use it in its original meaning, which the author makes sure to include. Meanings that often go back to the 1300s.

My only complaint is the segment on the use of "literally" when describing something that is quite obviously not what literally happened. The author's argument is that when someone uses an expression (the given example is "I was (literally) climbing the walls"), without the word "literally", the speaker is still describing the event literally, but it is understood to be figurative. When they add the word "literally", they are still describing a literal event, and it is still understood to be figurative. It was a good argument, but that use still bothers me because it is using a word with a clearly defined meaning to mean the opposite of what it does.

Finally, the book includes a very important grammar lesson: There is only one rule in English writing that is followed everywhere, in fiction, in nonfiction, in technical writing and even in poetry. That rule is that you *never* start a sentence with a comma.… (más)