Anguished English is a compilation of accidental assaults on our language by Richard Lederer, an American author, speaker, and teacher best known for his books on word play and the English language and his use of oxymorons. His column, "Looking at Language", is syndicated in newspapers and magazines throughout the United States.
Richard has written more than 30 books, including Anguished English, Get Thee to a Punnery, Crazy English, A Man of My Words, The Word Circus, The Miracle of Language, The Cunning Linguist, and Word Wizard, and Presidential Trivia. Known as a "verbivore", a word he coined in the early 1980s, Lederer's interests include uncovering word origins, pointing out common grammatical errors and fallacies, and exploring palindromes, anagrams, and other forms of recreational wordplay. Lederer wrote the foreword to Words at Play: Quips, Quirks and Oddities, by O.V. Michaelsen (Sterling Publishing Company, New York, 1998), and to Weather Facts and Fun (2009), a children's book on weather, co-written by Josh Judge and Kathe Cussen and published by SciArt Media. He has been elected International Punster of the Year and was the 2002 recipient of the Golden Gavel of Toastmasters International.
Lederer is a member of American Mensa and is often a featured speaker at its annual gatherings. He is a regular contributor to Mensa's monthly Bulletin, usually titling his column "Looking at Language" but occasionally devoting it to some other subject such as presidential trivia.
Lederer is the father of Howard Lederer and Annie Duke, both world-renowned poker players, and Katy Lederer, an author and poet. He lives with his wife, Simone van Egeren, in San Diego, California. They met at a Mensa Gathering.
Lederer served as the 2007 commencement speaker at Case Western Reserve University.
The dark ages, was a term coined by the Italian scholar, Fransesco Petrarca, a critic of the post-Roman era. The accurate term, however, would be the middle ages. A simple observation of humanity over the years would tell us that religion in one form or another was always in control. In fact, I would argue that, by comparison, the middle ages was relatively better than the eras before it, where slavery was still commonplace, and new ideas were usually discarded.
9:09pm
comment on atheist quote:
There once was a time when all people believed in God and the church ruled. This time was called the Dark Ages.
And in America these people were known as the Tea Party
12:36pm
comment on atheist quote:
There once was a time when all people believed in God and the church ruled. This time was called the Dark Ages.