Language
How can ‘sanction’ mean two opposing things?
Sir Keir Starmer said ‘he could “not imagine” the circumstances in which he would sanction a new referendum’ on Scottish…
Spinoza, Epicurus and the question of ‘epikoros’
With surprise, I heard from a Jewish friend that a Hebrew term for a heretic is epikoros, apparently derived from…
Is Nigel Farage a ‘viper’?
‘Farage is no leader,’ said Rupert Lowe MP. ‘He is a coward and a viper.’ Cedric Hardwicke immediately came to…
How do you pronounce ‘mayoralty’?
‘Six!’ cried my husband, waving his notebook as he monitored the by-elections. He wasn’t counting Reform wins but the ways…
‘Trillions’ doesn’t add up
‘Oh no, darling’ said my husband, stirring from torpor in his armchair, ‘only about seven ounces of you is bacteria…
What is ‘misogynoir’?
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex have been troubled by two verbal peculiarities in a week. The Duchess corrected a…
Why do we diminish ‘compendious’?
My husband has been telling me, at some length, about the Gamages Christmas catalogue that fired his childhood imagination and…
Do you ‘damp down’ or ‘tamp down’?
‘Dampfschifffahrt!’ shouted my husband as though it were funny. I had been saying how strange it was that explosive gas…
What does Meghan mean by ‘intentional living’?
‘What are your intentions towards my daughter?’ said my husband, screwing an imaginary monocle into his eye. We had been…
Are you offended by ‘hard-working families’?
Scarcely a day passes without a newspaper story about some absurd ‘language guide’ issued by a public body. This week…
Geoffrey Madan and the joy of ‘unusual articles’
In 1924 Geoffrey Madan retired, aged 29, and devoted himself to books. ‘A genius for friendship, selfless devotion to progressive…
RFK Jr and the curious birth of ‘brainchild’
‘No, RFK didn’t have a tapeworm eating his brain,’ declared my husband in the rare tone he adopts when he…
Does Rachel Reeves know what ‘kickstart’ means?
To ‘kickstart economic growth’ is the first (‘number one’) of Labour’s five ‘missions’ to rebuild Britain. That is what the…
In search of Pico della Mirandola, the quintessential Renaissance Man
Though the scholar himself remains an enigma, his theories about language as a portal to the divine are explored in depth by Edward Wilson-Lee
‘Loved ones’ are everywhere at this time of year
‘My heart will melt in your mouth,’ said my husband gallantly, unwrapping some leeks from a copy of the Sun…
