[Ads-l] another non-fiction novel

[Ben Zimmer]

Yeah, it's not the use of "novel" that I was stunned by... more the idea of
Mel Gibson as the beloved James Murray. (Mel's had the rights to
Winchester's book for years now, but I don't think anyone guessed he was
going to cast himself as Murray.) Or is that what you meant by "weird and
disgusting"?


On Tue, Aug 2, 2016 at 12:52 PM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>
wrote:

> >stunned by this news
>
> Remember, I first noticed this usage in the mid '80s.
>
> Still weird and disgusting though.
>
> JL
>
> On Tue, Aug 2, 2016 at 11:47 AM, Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> https://www.theguardian.com/film/2016/aug/02/mel-gibson-sean-penn-oed-creators-professor-madman
> > Mel Gibson and Sean Penn to play creators of Oxford English Dictionary
> > Based on the bestselling novel, Professor and the Madman will star the
> > Oscar-winners as two obsessive men who worked together in the 19th
> century.
> >
> > ---
> >
> > (I'm too stunned by this news to comment on anything other than the use
> of
> > the word "novel" for Simon Winchester's non-fiction book "The Professor
> and
> > the Madman," published in the UK as "The Surgeon of Crowthorne.")
> >
> > --bgz
> >
>
>

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org