- Paperback: 100 pages
- Publisher: Random House USA Inc (1 Dec 1995)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0679764275
- ISBN-13: 978-0679764274
- Product Dimensions: 18 x 11.9 x 1.5 cm
- Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
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2,350,323 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #61 in Books > Reference > Dictionaries & Thesauri > English (Specific Aspects)
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Product Description
Product Description
This is the book everyone had waited for. Here, in one convenient, comprehensive volume, is the complete story of the word still considered the most vulgar utterance in the English language. Rather than tired clichés or graceless jokes, The F-Word contains page after page of actual, uncensored examples of the word in all its varied and robust use, from its first appearance in English in the fifteenth century.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
7 of 10 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Don't be fooled by this books rather ambiguous title. This book is neither crude nor vulger. It is a very well informed referance book. It gives detailed and acurate observations in a dictionary format of all the occurances of the F-word from the 1500's to the present day. That said it is still laugh-out-load funny! If you read it as a comody book it won't disapoint. It is equally at home on the shelvesw of an English scholar as on the table of a VI Form common room! Top stuff!!!!
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
7 reviews
20 of 21 people found the following review helpful
A fascinating look at a well-worn word.
25 Mar 1998
Format:Paperback
This book is certainly different, if nothing else. It contains a distressingly complete etymology of everyone's favourite word, dating back to the 1600s.
All sorts of phrases containing 'the magic word' are included and referenced, as well as some words of equivalent meaning, some euphemisms for it ('freak', for example), and some great abbreviations (eg 'BUFF').
A great range of sources are used, from James Joyce to Madonna to Usenet erotica newsgroup posts. All serve to illustrate the point that the 'F-word' is one of the more versatile words in our language, and can fit into virtually any situation.
All in all, it's a fascinating and funny read for anyone interested in the English language, and I'm sure it says something that the history of a word such as this is so much more easily documented than probably any other word.
6 of 7 people found the following review helpful
F'in fabulous reference for the lexicon geek
9 July 2004
Format:Paperback
Thanks to ADHD, I have a hard time focusing for any length of time on the written word, but I love reference books and I love the English language. I have numerous lexicons from American Slang, to quotations, scientific dictionaries, etc. This one is not for the kids, but it has come in helpful a number of times.
I used to feel pretty hip, but now that my teen years are far behind me, I no longer know everything - and I am really feeling like an old codger when I hear a new phrase on TV or in a movie I've never heard before.
If someone has remolded the "F-word" into another word or phrase, it's in this little dictionary. Almost an encyclopedia of the F-word. Each entry gives an approximate date of usage (some usages are timeless, and used for over a hundred years, some are over a hundred years old and just aren't used at all. If the phrase or word first showed up in a book or movie, that reference is also given. Examples are cited and the origins of how each word evolved (as appropriate) are also noted.
As needed, a listing will note if it is a colloquialism for an age group, racial group, sexual lifestyle group, etc.
I had no idea what Stevie Wonder's song "Bad Mamma Jamma" meant until reading the definition in this text!
The illustrations are clever, and surprisingly not vulgar, considering what book they are in. This is far more than just a snicker-fest - although you can sit down and read it and giggle here & there, it is truly a reference book for American slang at its worst.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
the first and last word on this world-class Word. . .
2 Nov 1998
Format:Paperback
The F Word. . .proves to be a rare item indeed: a comprehensive, vastly eclectic, tongue-in-cheek serious treatment that has to be the first and last word on this world-class Word. For the curious layperson, it will be a source of amazement and information, a good deal of it funny.
As reviewed by Benedict B. Kimmelmann, in the Summer 1996 (Vol. XXIII, No. 1) issue of VERBATIM, The Language Quarterly.
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