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English language

Broken English

by Thomas Frank,

The radio was tuned to NPR, the subject was austerity, and the great observers of our political moment were speaking with their customary authority. The conversation wandered to and fro,…

From a letter to Mark Twain, postmarked October 1, 1879, from Carl Jensen, a customs officer in Stubbekøbing, Denmark. Twain’s annotation reads, “Preserve this remarkable letter.” Dear Mark Twain: Letters…

Help!

From comments on the Wikipedia entry for the Beatles. Last fall, Wikipedia conducted a community-wide poll to settle the below dispute, which began in 2004. Users voted for lowercase “the.”…