Learning to Read with Grandma, Snoopy, and Charlie Brown
Today, November 26, is the birthday of Charles Schultz (1922–2000), the creator of the beloved Peanuts comic strip. Schultz and his characters will forever be special to me because they played a big part in my becoming a lover of books and reading. Snoopy and Charlie Brown didn’t become literary giants for me on their [...]
A Little Wisdom from the 1906 Chicago Manual of Style
The University of Chicago Press recently released the sixteenth edition of The Chicago Manual of Style. This is the first time the press is publishing the print and online editions at the same time, and to mark the occasion, they’re offering a free download of a facsimile of the 1906 edition. I downloaded my copy [...]
Joshua Mowll: Prepare for Adventure!
Why read grown-up books when you can read something fun? About a year and a half ago, a friend and I stumbled upon a book called Operation Red Jericho in a discount bookstore. It looked neat and only cost four dollars, so we both snatched up a copy. That was the best four dollars I’ve [...]
Tags: Joshua Mowll
Oh, the Places You’ll Go! (Dr. Seuss)
Oh, the Places You’ll Go (published in 1990) was Dr. Seuss’s last book. Over the years, it’s become a somewhat predictable but still fun graduation gift and, since this is graduation season, what better time to write about this entertaining piece of inspiration? I have owned three copies of this book. The first I bought [...]
The Mother Tongue (Bill Bryson)
English doesn’t always make sense, but that’s okay. I don’t always make sense either, which may partially explain why I enjoy learning about the little quirks of English; they make my quirks seem insignificant. I first read The Mother Tongue in the early 1990s and was reintroduced to it a few years ago when my [...]
Lapsing Into a Comma (Bill Walsh)
This book is amusingly and appropriately subtitled The Curmudgeon’s Guide to the Many Things That Can Go Wrong in Print—And How to Avoid Them. I’m not a curmudgeon yet, but I think I have great potential to become one someday, and I’ve seen my share of characters lapse into commas, so Walsh’s book became an [...]
Your Favorite Seuss
This, somewhat obviously, is related to Age-appropriate Reading. I was actually going to write a serious post today about hyphens and their difficulties, but I don’t feel like it. I would much rather run and do something fun! And what could be more fun than Dr. Seuss? Your Favorite Seuss is a collection of thirteen [...]
The Authoritative Calvin and Hobbes (Bill Watterson)
“Rats. I can’t tell my gum from my silly putty.” I just hate it when then happens. For reasons I have never really understood, many people think I am very serious, a deep-thinking intellectual who just doesn’t know how to have fun. What planet do these people come from? Sure, I listen to NPR and [...]
“One Art” (Elizabeth Bishop)
“The art of losing isn’t hard to master,” at least, according to my favorite poem by my favorite poet. “One Art” has been my favorite poem for about twenty years now. I discovered it when I was twentyish, or even a little younger, back before I’d learned the “art of losing.” At that point I [...]
The Deluxe Transitive Vampire (Karen Elizabeth Gordon)
As much as I enjoy language and grammar, I don’t very often read grammar books for fun. Most grammar books are informative and interesting in their own way, but they will not keep you turning the pages late into the night. Enter Karen Elizabeth Gordon and The Deluxe Transitive Vampire. This is a grammar book [...]
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