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Start giftingBagels, Bumf, and Buses
This audiobook uses AI narration.
We’re taking steps to make sure AI narration is transparent.
Learn moreWhere do our everyday words come from? The bagel you eat for breakfast, the bumf you have to wade through at the office, and the bus that takes you home again: we use these words without thinking about their origins or how their meanings have changed over time. Simon Horobin takes the listener on a journey through a typical day, showing how the words we use to describe routine activities—getting up, going to work, eating meals—have surprisingly fascinating histories.
Simon Horobin is Professor of English Language and Literature at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of Magdalen College. He has written extensively on the history, structure, and uses of the English language. He is the author of How English Became English, Does Spelling Matter?, and books on the history of English, and the language of Chaucer.
Born and raised in Southampton, England, Shaun Grindell is an accomplished actor who trained at the Calland School of Speech and Drama and the Lee Strasberg Actors Institute in London. As an audiobook narrator, he has narrated many titles in different genres. Among his most notable works are the Hamish Macbeth mysteries by M. C. Beaton. Shaun also garnered an AudioFile Earphones Award for his reading of The Roving Party by Rohan Wilson.
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