(Ebook) The Warden of English: The Life of H.W. Fowler by McMorris, Jenny ISBN 9780198662549, 0198662548

(Ebook) The Warden of English: The Life of H.W. Fowler by McMorris, Jenny ISBN 9780198662549, 0198662548

Henry Watson Fowler was born in Tonbridge, Kent, in 1858. This is the first full biography of his life, and is based on meticulous research from previously unpublished papers, letters, and material from the Oxford University Press archives. It tells the story of his work on The King's Englishand Modern English Usage, and on the Concise and Pocket Oxford Dictionaries, and of his collaboration on some of these projects with his brother Frank. The development of the Fowlers' books is described for the first time, from the struggles to achieve an acceptable style for the Concise and PocketOxford Dictionaries, to the planning and preparation of Modern English Usage. Against the descriptions of Fowler's work is set the story of a man whose career began as a schoolmaster, but who moved to London to begin a new life as a writer. Jenny McMorris chronicles the life of a fascinating and colourful figure who, amongst other things, found love and married at the age of50, and struggled with the authorities to be able to enlist during World War I at an elderly age. Written to coincide with the 75th anniversary of the publication of Fowler's Modern English Usage, this fascinating account of one of the most influential figures in the history of the development of the English language gives an insight into the man behind the scholar.