Review: Alphabet Juice by Roy Blount Jr.

Despite the fact the most of my friends told me to read things that weren’t linguistic while I was on vacation, I picked this book up. I figured that, since Blount is a journalist and not a linguist, it wouldn’t be like real language reading. It would be fun. And, the subtitles promised, “the energies, gists and spirits of letters, words and combinations thereof; their roots, bones, innards, piths, pips and secret parts, tinctures, tonics and essences; with examples of the their usage foul and savory.”

That sounds fun, right? (Well, it sounds fun if you’re a nerd like me.)

And, the book isn’t bad. I just don’t feel like it is what I was promised. There are not a lot of “roots, bones, piths and secret parts”. There are some but not for every word. And, some of Blount’s “pith and innards” seems to be features of sounds or phonology that he points out to support his thesis that language isn’t arbitrary. But, a lot of language is arbitrary. It is actually a design feature. It has the flexibility that it has largely because of its arbitrary parts. But, whatever. I’m trying to not be a linguist, just someone who is interested in words here.

There were a lot of anecdotes in the book. Some of which were funny, some of which were just, well, anecdotal. And, often not having to do with the words but rather one instance of one word’s usage.

My friend Melissa recommended it to me. And, I looked for her review of it just now to see if she liked it. Because I have to say that my opinion of the book is coming down on the side of ‘boo’. Anecdotes about your life in words can be fun. But, believe me when I say (after reading 1 semester and 1 summer session’s worth of papers on etymologies) where words come from is sometimes surprising, often fun, every now and then shocking and always interesting. I expected so much from this book based on its title, and it just didn’t deliver.