The Adventure of English

The Biography of a Language
Author: Melvyn Bragg
Genre: nonfiction
Publication info: Arcade Publishing, 2003
Pages: 322

Melvyn Bragg is a novelist as well as a nonfiction author who has written on a variety of topics. In The Adventure of English he writes not as a linguist but as someone who is keenly interested in the development of the language. So it was interesting to use this book as our history text during our study abroad in Great Britain.

As a linguistics student who has taken a couple classes on the history of English, I found it hard to get into this book. Most of the information wasn’t new to me. The approach, however, is unique. Bragg warns in the introduction that he writes about the English language as if it were a living entity with a mind and will of its own. And that’s exactly what he does. English settles down, gets attacked, fights back, becomes smothered, grows, expands, absorbs. It’s a different way of looking at things, but it can also get pretty tiring with how dramatic he sometimes makes it out to be.

Speaking of dramatic, Bragg does seem to enjoy using an epic style in this book. I wonder if it’s the novelist in him. And it’s not only English itself that gets this treatment. Major players in the development of the language—the Catholic Church, Tyndale, Shakespeare—also get some dramatic (and shamelessly opinionated) descriptions. Not very academic stuff, but I guess it is entertaining.

I do applaud him for taking a global approach to English. American English gets several chapters, including the language brought in by the slaves. Bragg also features Australian English, Caribbean English, and the varied forms that English has taken in Europe and Asia. Pretty ambitious for an amateur linguist, and he does a good job of it, too.

I have to say, though, that I was a little disappointed in Bragg’s emphasis on the vocabulary of English above everything else. Throughout the book he gives lists of words, phrases, and expressions that came from different sources and time periods. His research is impressive and interesting, but a language is much more than the individual words that make it up. A language is also how the words go together, when and why they are used, and many other things. Bragg pays less attention to these other things. I know I can’t expect him to give an in-depth study of every aspect of English throughout its history, but I definitely felt that his look at the language was imbalanced. Of course, there are plenty of other books to make up the difference.

I have been picky in my comments on this book. I blame that on my being a language nerd. That said, I would recommend this book to all of the language nerds out there. If you’re looking for a serious study of English, this probably isn’t the book for you, but if you want to learn more about how our beautiful, crazy, powerful language came to be what it is, give this book a try. Prepare for an adventure.