Angels, Barbarians and Nincompoops

Angels, Barbarians and Nincompoops: . . . and a lot of other words you thought you knew

Anthony Esolen
TAN Books, 2017
196 pp., $24.95
ISBN: 978-1-5051-8074-3

Reviewed by Marie Dudzik

When I was in graduate school, I was required to take a class in the history of the English language. I really looked forward to that class because I imagined that we would spend our time digging into the emergence of the English language from its Germanic roots, through the additions of the Norman invasion, to the rich and varied language we speak today. I was wrong. The professor treated it as a requirement to be plodded through and gotten over with. No fun. No romance. Just lists to memorize and quizzes to take. It was disappointing.

The perfect remedy for such an experience is Professor Esolen’s book. Angels, Barbarians and Nincompoops is a breezy little book about the romance of English words: where they came from, how they got to their modern usage, and some of their adventures along the way. Esolen has selected dozens of words and presents one- to two-page histories of that word, including origins, changes in meaning, and usages through time. It’s like a box of chocolates: small, delicious morsels to be enjoyed slowly and over time. It’s a book to leave around to pick up at odd moments, when a bit of refreshment is needed. In his introductory material, Esolen advises reading just a little at a time, even just one entry per day. He also provides a basic definition of Grimm’s Law, which I do remember from that awful graduate class was a pretty big deal in the development of English. Basic knowledge of Grimm’s Law enables users of English to understand the relationship between words derived from Germanic languages and words derived from Latin or Greek.

Relationships are what this book reveals: relationships between Latin and Germanic words, relationships between how Old English speakers use a word and how Modern English speakers use a word, relationships between secular and religious meanings of words. And the religious aspects of the words do come out. After all, this book is published by a Catholic book company and written by a man who is most well-known for his writing on the Faith. Of course, the religious viewpoint is vitally important, especially now, when the media and academia are intent on having us believe that words have no solid meaning but mean only what is meant at a particular moment. Since our lives are lived in both time and eternity, the words we use should be able to reflect that belief. So despite the lightness of the book, there is a certain gravity to Esolen’s subject. Words do have concrete meanings. To deny that means to be unable to communicate. It would be back to Babel; it would be denying God’s gift of language. Chimps may be able to ask for bananas by choosing the right vocabulary card, but only man can ask for God’s grace and mercy through the language of the psalms or the poetry of John Donne. A rose by any other name does not smell as sweet, and to be a confident and competent user of the English language, it is important to know why.

Of course, this book focuses on words from English, a language notorious for its rule bending and borrowing. The free-wheeling nature of English is what makes the stories behind its words so varied and interesting. And it makes English unique among languages. Shakespeare is Shakespeare because he was able to manipulate his native language to an extent few other writers were able to do, until, perhaps, Chesterton and P. G. Wodehouse. Shakespeare’s audience understood the richness of Shakespeare’s language and so were able to enjoy and appreciate the plays on all their levels of meaning. What we consider the “hidden” meanings of Shakespeare’s plays were not so hidden to his contemporaries. We have simply forgotten what they knew. To know the true value of English words is to speak with the authority of our ancestors; it is to participate in the democracy of the dead.

For those who want to take this book more seriously, Esolen provides a series of short quizzes. The reader can take a pre-test; questions to answer before reading the book to find out how much the reader knows about words and their meanings, with the invitation to take the quiz again after finishing the book to see how much one has learned. And one will learn something from this book, if only that the words we use every day have a richer meaning and a more storied past than we ever knew. In an age when studies show that our vocabularies are shrinking, a book that puts the fun back in English is sorely needed.