Taming the Tongue in the Heyday of English Grammar (1711-1851)

Bryan A. Garner's 'Taming the Tongue in the Heyday of English Grammar (1711-1851)' is the companion to the Grolier Club exhibition of the same title. Featuring 100 items, Garner's book makes the primers of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries come alive in ways their concerned and idiosyncratic authors might not have envisioned. While Garner makes no mention of duels fought over the parts of speech, he shows that the grammarians of the period were a contentious and opinionated lot. The entries in 'Taming the Tongue' are packed with scrupulously recorded information on the content and publication details of the grammars, as well as tantalizing anecdotes from the authors' lives. Commentaries by Thomas Cable, David Crystal, Edward Finegan, Lane Greene, Christopher Ricks, John Simpson, and Ingrid Tieken-Boon van Ostade and three appendices round out this lively book, which will appeal to scholars and aficionados alike. 0 0Exhibition: The Grolier Club, New York, USA (03.03.-15.05.2021).