Bücher veröffentlicht von Houghton Mifflin

From the bawdy to the sublime, the best writing on language for word lovers, grammar mavens, and armchair linguists. A brilliant, witty, and engaging compendium on the uses and abuses of the English language.With bestselling narratives such as The Professor and the Madman to edicts by popular grammar mavens including Pat O'Conner and Barbara Wallraff, it is clear readers outside of academia are becoming more and more intrigued with language. Founded by legendary lexicographer Lawrence Urdang, for thirty years Verbatim has published amusing and intriguing articles on the English language and the idea of language in general. Here, for the first time, is a collection of Verbatim's greatest hits and wondrous discoveries on concept, usage, jargon, wordplay, linguistics, blunders, malapropisms, and more. With contributors such as Richard Lederer, Jesse Sheidlower, and Joe Queenan, lexicography heavyweights like Frederick Cassidy and William Kunstler, Verbatim is a smart and sassy collection for anyone seeking the highly scholarly or the completely frivolous. From the uses of language in the Bible to the components of a British soccer chant, this astounding collection is sure to offer something for every language enthusiast and word lover to enjoy.

A single city woman meets Mr. Right-he has amber eyes and a wily heart. There's only one catch . . . he has four legs and a tail.Relatively indifferent to the natural world, allergic to dogs, and happily independent, writer Louise Bernikow never had a pet and knew nothing about caring for one. But one day while running along Manhattan's Hudson River, she came across an abandoned boxer. He had a gimpy leg and a dim past, but Bernikow instantly, bewilderingly, did the one thing her mother always warned her not to do-she brought the strange male home.Here is the comical and offbeat story of their first year together. Libro, as she comes to call him (for "book," in Spanish), introduces her to the curious world of dog runs and dog people, and to a local dive where the bartender pulls pints from the tap and dog biscuits from the drawer. Bernikow, in turn, introduces Libro to the eccentric neighbors and to life as a media hound. When they meet a handsome man and his equally handsome dachshund, life takes an unexpected turn for both of them.Wonderfully written and captivating to the last, this is a remarkable tale of companionship.

The final legacy of the Nobel Prize-winning author of The Labyrinth of SolitudeItinerary records the evolution of the political ideas of Octavio Paz, the great Mexican writer who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1990. It is an intellectual autobiography, in a sense, but also a sentimental and even passionate one. In his thoughts Paz realized the past was inseparable from the present. And so he tells the story of his journey through time, from youth to adulthood. It is not a straight line, nor is it a circle; it is instead a spiral that turns ceaselessly over, bringing into view a time seventy years in the past and the actions of today. It is the final work by a great thinker and a magnificent writer.

"Names? You want names? No one knows better ones than John Kenneth Galbraith? (San Diego Union-Tribune). With the dazzling insight, humor, and literary skill that mark Galbraith as one of the most distinguished writers of our time, Name-Dropping charts the political landscape of the past sixty-five years. Drawing on a lifetime of access to many great public figures, the famous economist offers a clear-eyed, unsparing, and amusing ?look at prominent people . . . [he] has known, from FDR on? (Larry King, USA Today) and offers a rich and uniquely personal history of the century ? a history he helped to shape.

Already a best-selling addition to the series, this year's Best American Travel Writing is a far-flung collection chosen by travel writer extraordinaire Paul Theroux, who has selected pieces about ?the spell in the wilderness, the letter home from foreign parts, the dangerous adventure, the sentimental journey, the exposé, the shocking revelation, the eyewitness report, the ordeal, the quest . . . Travel is an attitude, a state of mind.? Theroux's most recent novel is Hotel Honolulu.

This engaging collection of National Public Radio broadcasts and magazine pieces by one of America's best-known linguists covers the waterfront of contemporary culture by taking stock of its words and phrases. From our metaphors for the Internet (?Virtual Rialto?) to the perils of electronic grammar checkers (?The Software We Deserve?), from traditional grammatical bugaboos (?Sex and the Singular Verb?) to the ways we talk about illicit love (?Affairs of State?), Geoffrey Nunberg shows just how much the language we use from day to day reveals about who we are and who we want to be.

The author, a leading travel industry expert, has spent 25 years compiling data for this book. Beginning with an overview of the leisure travel market, he then presents a psychologically based allocentrism-psychocentrism framework that explains why people do or do not travel, their various types of vacations, expectations and sources of dissatisfaction. Also included are numerous ways in which hotels, tour operators, airlines, travel agencies, car rentals, food services and other businesses can protect themselves during down swings and even prosper.

Andy and Tamika can't wait for a weekend of fun in the big city, but Tamika's aunt Mandy has planned trips to boring museums and fancy restaurants. Even worse, someone is dropping hamsters off the top of Aunt Mandy's building, causing trouble everywhere . . . and getting Andy blamed. It's a big-city mystery that only Andy Russell can solve!