June 4, 2021 Fifty Sounds by Polly Barton Reviewed by Anna Hollingsworth Why country X? Why language Y? Anyone who has lived abroad or taken up a foreign language will be familiar…
December 15, 2020 Fifty Words for Snow by Nancy Campbell Reviewed by Liz Dexter I greatly enjoyed reading Nancy Campbell’s meditation on the icy places of the world, The Library of Ice. last year,…
April 21, 2020 Let’s Talk: How English Conversation Works by David Crystal Review by Liz Dexter “What makes a successful conversation?” is a question David Crystal considers asking people in his new book – and, well,…
February 5, 2020 Learning Languages in Early Modern England by John Gallagher Review by Liz Dexter Has it ever struck you that before England obtained its empire, no one else in the world bothered to speak…
September 17, 2019 Futurekind: Design by and for the People by Robert Phillips Review by Liz Dexter Robert Phillips is a senior tutor on the Design Products course at the Royal College of Art, as well as…
November 2, 2017 The Lost Words by Robert Macfarlane and Jackie Morris Review by Peter Reason When our postman handed me the package that contained my review copy of The Lost Words I blurted out, “I’ve…
September 28, 2017 Every Word is a Bird We Teach to Sing : Encounters with the Mysteries & Meanings of Language by Daniel Tammet Reviewed by Liz Dexter You may remember Tammet from his autism memoir, Born on a Blue Day, and his fascination with words and languages as…
