Fun books about words

The holidays are a great time to read. For most people. I'm tending my books like a giant orchard, seeing the covers and musing about the ones I've read, the ones I haven't and the ones I'm permanently part way through.

I found a collection of books about the English Language, and thought they were worth blogging about (especially since some were sent to me for review!).

These are mostly entertaining, but also great for your brain. Curiosity's good for you, and these books encourage you to keep following your curiosity about language.

Away with Words by Ruth Wajnryb is a "frolic through the landscape of language". It's the kind of book you can dip into when you feel like it, with each chapter exploring the history of a particular word. Wajnryb is like a comedian, in that she asks very pertinent, quite funny questions - but she also knows language, so she's doubly helpful. She's written another, similar book called Cheerio Tom, Dick and Harry about the kind of words we just don't hear any more (like cheerio).

Accomodating Brocolli in the Cemetary a) breaks your spell-checker, and b) asks why nobody can spell? It answers that question pretty quickly; the English language is fiendishly difficult to get right (as the word fiendish attests). What Eats, Shoots and Leaves did for punctuation, Accomodating Brocolli in the Cemetary does for spelling, although with not as much publicity.

In format it's more of an encyclopedia (or encyclopaedia) or almanac, another one you can dip into as you please.

Ducks in a Row: An A-Z of Offlish is an entertaining look at the kind of language we use in business. What's cool is that many of the definitions are pretty accurate, even helpful, and then the snark jumps in and adds a dash of funny. For example:

Maverick

1. (n) a nonconformist (from Samuel Maverick, a 19th century Texas cattle-raiser)

2. (n) An idiosyncratic rule-breaker and entrepreneur whose gambles have been marvellously rewarded.

Usage: fawning journalists, cowed executives and managers.

See also Entrepreneur, Monster

(And this was published before Palin!)

The Superior Person's Third Book of Words is an utterly useless book except for the humour value of having it on the shelf. It is full of words you never knew existed for things you didn't know existed.

For example: necrencephalus = a softening of the brain. The book adds, "Superior insult word". Nice!

Actually, it's not completely useless. It could be useful if you are genuinely that insecure to make people want to think you're clever because you use long words, or if you need to find really obscure words for passwords or server names.

Not only that, it's funny and it will teach you stuff you never needed to know. Not that useless after all!

It's a bit late for gift suggestions, but if you're a writer or an engaged reader, this will tickle your brain and your funnybone, and make you a generally awesome person to be around.

I'm living proof. Apparently.

(Photo from here)

Mini book review: Great Speeches for Better Speaking

I've just finished reading Great Speeches for Better Speaking by Michael E Eidenmuller (published by McGraw Hill).

It's not quite holiday reading, but neither is it a textbook. It's a curated journey Eidenmuller takes you on, through six historical speeches of the 20th century, complete with full recordings.

Eidenmuller's passion for his subject is almost tangible. I was a little disappointed, however, in how brief and tantalizing some of the commentary is. Still, with recordings and full transcripts available, Eidenmuller's commentary is more of a kickstarter, and he offers a few hints of where to go next, but leaves the journey up to us.

He also brings up the "Great Debate", between Plato who argued that rhetoric was dangerous, and Aristotle who said it was a powerful force for democracy - if everyone understands it.

It's an important question, especially in am age where social media gives everyone with an Internet connection, a voice.

Highly recommended reading if you speak, write, or just enjoy a good speech.

How to write if you're not a writer

Writing doesn't come naturally for everyone, but we all need to write well in our daily routines. Technology has made written communication all the more important. And for some, it adds pressure and anxiety.

No-one cooks at the same time as they assemble their ingredients, yet that's how many people expect to be able to write. They sit down at the keyboard, and expect to get the message right in one go.

But writing is made up of three distinct parts, a bit like preparing a meal.

Here's how to take the pressure off yourself, and create better writing at the same time:

1. Gather your ingredients.
Who are you talking to? What do you want to say to them? Identify the key parts of your message, not in sentences but in ideas.

For example, you need to invite someone to a collaboration website you're setting up, and you want to give them some context around why you're inviting them.

The key parts of your message - your ingredients - could be:

* I'm inviting you to this collaboration website
* The collaboration website does these things...
* The team who will be collaborating on the website are...
* The purpose of us doing this is...

Notice how there's no numbers, just bullet points. We don't put things in order until step 2.

Even better than bullet points is a mind-map, or post-it notes. You're gathering all the ingredients, make sure you have everything you need, and not any more.

2. Sort the ingredients.
What part of the message needs to come first? If you're using post-its or index cards, you can physically re-sort them. Try to find the logical flow of your message.

How do you find the logical flow? it's a bit of an art, but this may help. Think of the key parts that would make more sense if you had the information from previous key points.

For example, telling me who's on the team makes more sense if I know what the purpose of the team is. Telling me what the collaboration website does makes more sense if I know I'm invited to the website.

As you do this, you may find that some of your cards are actually saying the same message. That's good! We're making sure we're saying everything we need to say in as few words as possible. Both parts are important, "everything we need to say", AND, "as few words as possible".

3. Write the message.
You now have your ingredients and are ready to start cooking. You have the skeleton and can put some flesh on the bones. This is where you can think about all that fun stuff like grammar and spelling.

The good thing is, you don't have to think about the other stuff, like what part of the message goes where, or whether you've included everything you need to include. You've already done all that stuff.

----

I'm not a great cook, but when I do cook people are generally pretty happy with what I prepare.

It helps if I have a recipe. But as I practice, I also start to see beyond the recipe, to the principles of the recipe. I start to experiment, to discover my own way of cooking.

Writing is the same. We all can write; some of us need a bit more structure than others. And like any skill, you will get better and faster as you go.

What I tweet about (in the last year)

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Testing a mobile blog

... from my phone. And all of a sudden I can't think what to say!

Caution: L&P's promo is awesome

Caught up with me old mate Brendan Boughen (not pictured here!) the other day.

Brendan's working for Ogilvy PR, and he told me about L&P's latest web promotion, Paeroa Tourism, which he described as a cross between Flight of the Chonchords and Borat.

He was right. This is hilarious.



The media kit was... awesome too. A typewritten cover letter from Maurice Morrison, badly photocopied fliers touting the seven wonders of Paeroa (that's two more than Thames, in your face Thames!), a bright yellow t-shirt like Colin's wearing in the pic above, and a six pack of L&P. Thanks Brendan! Good humour and bribery will get you everywhere. Check out the Facebook page.

On a slightly more serious note, it brings up two thoughts for me:

• Yes it's the age of authenticity, but you can still carry off fictional characters in an online campaign if you do it very well, and if it's very funny. (Easy as that, eh!)
• New Zealand's small towns have a great opportunity to use social media to differentiate themselves. We have some really neat, quirky towns around the place like Bulls, Taihape (where iJump clients Gravity Canyon are based) and Tirau. (By the way, those photos are from another iJump client, EyeballNZ.com). Could they (should they) do a Coos Bay? And what on earth is it with Ngaruawahia? Looks deserted every time we go through (which admittedly isn't that often).
  

The Life and Death of Peter Sellers

I'd heard that The Life and Death of Peter Sellers was not for the fainthearted, but the cheerful opening titles lulled me into a forgetful sense of security.

It is full on. His life is a train wreck in slow motion. It is a tragedy. It is hard to like Sellers, which is a gutsy move for a film (you're supposed to like the protagonist).

I love most of Sellers' work. The Goon Show played a huge part in developing my off-beat sense of humour (made even more off-beat by the fact I was listening 30 years out of context).

But the life behind the laughs was a nightmare. Sellers was a boy who never grew up, who became entrapped in an industry that encourages emotional immaturity.

It's a very well-told movie, if you know Sellers and his work.

It makes me wonder: will the future enable the kind of big, but dysfunctional superstars like Sellers?

Or will the disruption that's happening in media and entertainment mean that vulnerable but gifted people like Sellers (and Michael Jackson, and many others) won't be able to insulate themselves from reality?

That's a long question. I bet the answer is even longer.