Between You and I: A Little Book of Bad English: Amazon.co.uk: James Cochrane, John Humphrys: Books

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Product Description

Robert McCrum, Observer
"A deeply-felt defence of proper English usage"

Terence Blacker, Independent
"A cool, disdainfully precise A-Z of linguistic misuse"

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Customer Reviews

6 Reviews

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4 star:		(3)
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Average Customer Review

3.2 out of 5 stars (6 customer reviews)

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136 of 147 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Between You and Me, 18 Oct 2003

By	Mr. L. J. Atterbury (PILA Poland) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This book is,between you and me,a little book of acerbic wit that takes a decidedly snobbish and elitist approach towards the ambiguities of English. The result is an entertaining and stimulating read as might be expected from those whose writing is pushed across the pages with a fiery arrogance.
James Cochrane rightly acknowledges that "English is a living language and must change",but it is here that problems arise. Take the word "ilk",for example. Cochrane lambastes his readers for using the word with the meaning of "like" or "kind" instead of "same",but surely this is a prime example of how the meaning of a word has changed. The same might be said of "community" or "light year". On the other hand he is without blame when dealing with the apostrophe,may and might,loathe and loath, and other conundrums of the English language.
It is precisely these controversies that make the book so stimulating;it raises questions that makes the reader react with the same verve as the author. A useful book to use in the classroom.

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123 of 139 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars a bad little book, 20 Dec 2003

By	T F Walker (Harpenden, Herts United Kingdom) - See all my reviews

I am angry with myself for wasting money on this book which is subtitled "a Little Book of Bad English". I had expected to find a book full of new and old corruptions of the English language, which it is, but the content is very scant. It's composed of just a few, apparently random, examples which offer very little of educational merit. I am sure that it only sells because of the foreword by John Humphrys, but he does little for his reputation by endorsing this trivial 'stocking-filler'.

I should advise anyone seeking real substance in this area to buy "Mind the Gaffe" by R L Trask (paperback from Penguin Books, 2002) where they will find at least 5 times as many examples, with more extensive explanations for �4 less.
My subtitle for "Between You and I" would be "a Bad Little Book of English."

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68 of 77 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An absolute hoot .., 12 Jan 2004

By	A. J. Sudworth "tonysudworth" (UK) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)

I was not sure if I dare write a review of this book. It is full of superb examples of the way the English language has been abused in recent years and I wondered if anything I might write would be so full of errors it would be a good advert for the book. Once you have read this book I think you will either put it down and say 'so what' or you will try that bit harder when writing your next document. Either way its a very interesting book and well worth taking the time to read it

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Most Recent Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars Another book for the smallest room of the house
A brilliant witty book filled with essentially trivia. As another reviewer states "a great hoot" would be possible to read and re-read without getting bored. Read more

Published 6 months ago by Karl Grocock

1.0 out of 5 stars Condescending and arrogant.
Seldom have I read a book that irritated me so much! Arrogant, condescending and completely without humour. Read more

Published on 9 Jan 2004 by Abplanalp Freda

4.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful... a great little book
This may not be the largest or prettiest book in the world but it's all the better for it. Instead of having to wade through a mass of verbose text, the author James Cochrane has... Read more

Published on 23 Dec 2003

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