Adam Jacot De Boinod Libri

Questo libro raccoglie una serie di parole impossibili, definizioni intraducibili, poetiche o irrilevanti, che l'autore ha raccolto in più di 150 lingue del mondo. Termini che definiscono in modo estremamente preciso fatti e situazioni che nelle altre lingue richiedono lunghe perifrasi: dai 27 modi di chiamare i baffi in albanese alla parola indonesiana che definisce "l'incontrollabile abitudine di dire cose imbarazzanti", al caso del giapponese ageotori, che esprime il concetto di "tagliare i capelli a qualcuno in occasione di una cerimonia ufficiale, e ottenere l'effetto contrario di peggiorare il suo aspetto".

From 'shotclog', a Yorkshire term for a companion only tolerated because he is paying for the drinks, to Albanian having 29 words to describe different kinds of eyebrows, the languages of the world are full of amazing, amusing and illuminating words and expressions that will improve absolutely everybody's quality of life. All they need is this book!This bumper volume gathers all three of Adam Jacot de Boinod's acclaimed books about language - The Wonder of Whiffling, The Meaning of Tingo and Toujours Tingo (their fans include everyone from Stephen Fry to Michael Palin) - into one highly entertaining, keenly priced compendium. As Mariella Frostup said 'You'll never be lost for words again!'

Did you know that people in Indonesia have a word that means to take off your clothes in order to dance'? Or how many words the Albanians have for eyebrows and moustaches? Or the Dutch word for skimming stones is plimpplamppletteren? is arranged by theme so you can compare attitudes all over the world to such subjects as food, the human body and the battle of the sexes. Here you can find not only those words for which there is no direct counterpart in English (such as the Japanese age-otori which means looking less attractive after a haircut), but also a frank discussion of exactly how many Eskimo' terms there are for snow, and a vast array of information exploring the wonderful and often downright strange world of words. Oh, and tingo means 'to take all the objects one desires from the house of a friend, one at a time, by asking to borrow them'.