Novelist Charles Dickens and the musician Prince were very different types of artists, but they also had a lot in common. A new book chronicling their extraordinary careers becomes a larger meditation on perfectionism and creativity itself. Plus...
Jackie in Wausau, Wisconsin, says her family used an odd word whenever someone took a sip and choked. She’s not seen it in print but suspects it’d be spelled something like furschluk. The family’s word is likely adapted from German verschlucken...
How hot is it? Well, poet Dylan Thomas found lots of memorable ways to describe a heat wave. In one letter to a friend, he wrote that it was so hot “My brains are hanging out like a dog’s tongue.” And: pestering country music stars for selfies is a...
Carl in Newport Beach, California, wonders why the prefix be- functions so differently in the words behead and befriend. Also, why do the words decapitated and beheaded have different prefixes? And what the be-doing there in bemoan and belabor? Like...
In 1803, a shy British pharmacist wrote a pamphlet that made him a reluctant celebrity. The reason? He proposed a revolutionary new system for classifying clouds — with Latin names we still use today, like cumulus, cirrus, and stratus. Also: when...
Sarah in San Antonio, Texas, says that when she goes to a restaurant and orders iced tea, the server usually asks, “Sweet or unsweet?” That doesn’t sound right to her. How do you unsweeten tea? Doesn’t the un- imply a “reversal of a state”? Not...