Bookishness

I heard a writer on NPR yesterday morning describe the post-Potter world. (At least I think it was on NPR. It could have been one of the local news bits they sometimes intermingle with the NPR stories. I couldn’t find the article when I looked on the Morning Edition site.) She said we need more books that get children to think thoughtfully.

Think thoughtfully? How else can you think?

Steven King discusses a drinking game that features such wit in On Writing.

And then tonight as I was getting ready for bed, I noticed TubaBoy’s book on the bar. He is reading (or has recently read) Wuthering Heights. That got me thinking. Is there an English infinitive to wuther? If not, from whence came the present participle? If so, how exactly does one wuther?

English is such a weird hodgepodge of languages. It’s a wonder any of us ever understands what anyone else says.

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15 November Update: Of course, when I looked it up, Brontë was right. Never argue nomenclature with a 19^th century writer. When the wind wuthers, it “blows with a dull roaring sound.”