New Year, New Books

The New Year post has brought me a copy of Jean Aitchison's The Articulate Mammal, an introduction to psycholinguistics that is at once highly readable and knowledgeable. It's one of those fascinating books that makes you turn to your spouse as you sit up reading in bed and say 'Well, I never knew that.....', it's full of insights and supplies an excellent overview of the development of the discipline.
A friend of mine has lent me her copy of Harry Thompson's novel This Thing of Darkness, which she rated as her absolutely best read of 2009. It was longlisted for the 2005 Booker prize and sadly the author died only a year later. I've read several reviews of it and they are all equally laudatory, and having started it over the Christmas holidays, it's starting to grow on me. I was initially put off by the '40 years before the mast' detail, which seemed reminiscent of a Patrick O'Brien tale, all poopdecks and marlin spikes, but the quality of the writing is undeniable. I shall persist with it. Boswell's Life of Johnson, although excellent, can tend towards same-iness if read in too large a chunk.
The AHRC funding has happily allowed me to order a couple of books for my studies: George Steiner's After Babel, and another Wallace Chafe book, the Meaning and Structure of Language, both of which I am hoping will provide additional grist for the linguistic doctoral mill. My mother, who has become very interested in the subject of the Crusades, will additionally receive Amin Maalouf's The Crusades Through Arab Eyes, in the interests of maintaining a balanced, scholarly approach.
Hopefully, the severe wintery weather will not delay their delivery by too much