3,018 words

The singer Édith Piaf famously, and throatily, regretted nothing about anything. But the poet John Betjeman wished that he’d had more sex. And the economist John Maynard Keynes that he’d drunk more champagne. Me? I regret two things much more important than recreational sex or champagne. (more…)

Front left detail of the Franks Casket, featuring Weyland the Smith and Anglo-Saxon futhorc runic writing

2,197 words

If you want a mouthful of history, just say “mouthful of history.” It’s a hybrid phrase, Germanic and Greek, combining two great European traditions that met and mingled on the island of Britain. But there’s a local flavor to it too: the second consonant of “mouthful” is distinctively English. That’s why we once had a good way to write that second consonant: in Old English, “mouth” was muð, pronounced “mooth.”  (more…)

1,962 words

The New England schlockmeister Stephen King is a bad but interesting writer. Success is an interesting phenomenon, after all, and King is one of the most successful writers who have ever lived. Born in 1947 in Portland, Maine, he has sold millions of books in dozens of languages and won even wider exposure through film adaptations of novels like Carrie (1974) and The Shining (1977). (more…)