Wordsmiths & Warriors

Abstract

Wordsmiths & Warriors relates a real journey of thousands of miles undertaken by David and Hilary Crystal. The result is a fascinating combination of English-language history and travelogue (the study gives detailed instructions on how to find each place mentioned). David is responsible for the descriptions, and Hilary, for the full-colour photographs. The book comprises a guide for those wishing to follow in their footsteps; at the same time, it reflects the chronology of the language. The Crystals visit places associated with such well-known writers as Chaucer, Shakespeare, and Wordsworth; dictionary compilers such as Johnson and Murray; and a number of well-known and lesser-known dialect writers, elocutionists, and grammarians. Warrior wordsmiths such as King Alfred are also mentioned.Wordsmiths & Warriors emphasises the centrality of the Anglo-Saxon, medieval and early modern periods in the development of the English language as it is known today. A progressive view of language change and transition is generally avoided in the study in favor of a more personal selection of texts. The scope of the book is wide, incorporating small villages as well as major cities, ancient texts and more modern ones. Fifty-seven chapters take us to places as far apart as St Albans, Peterborough, West Malvern, Grasmere, Bath, Pegwell Bay, Lindisfarne, Cerne Abbas, Bourne, Canterbury, and Oxford. Wordsmiths & Warriors gives its readers an appetite to know more as fascinating details about the relationship between places and literary works emerge. The most important names are included: Chaucer (Southwark and Canterbury); Shakespeare (Stratford-upon-Avon and Park Street, London – the location of the original Globe Theatre), Dryden, Burns, Wordsworth, Hardy, George Bernard Shaw, and Dylan Thomas. The Bible is discussed in detail in relation to a number of geographical locations, including Lutterworth, Leicestershire, where Wycliffe translated the Bible in the 14th century, and Hampton Court Palace, where the King James Bible evolved at the famous Hampton Court conference.