Have you ever wondered what makes a book a book?
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How stress affects your brain – Madhumita Murgia
Standard‘Stress isn’t always a bad thing; it can be handy for a burst of extra energy and focus, like when you’re playing a competitive sport or have to speak in public. But when it’s continuous, it actually begins to change your brain. Madhumita Murgia shows how chronic stress can affect brain size, its structure, and how it functions, right down to the level of your genes.’
‘Can eating right improve your exam grades?’
‘When you’re faced with a pile of revision, feeding your body as well as your brain may be the last thing on your mind. But can you give yourself an advantage simply by eating certain foods? And does drinking plenty of water really increase your chances of getting good grades?’
5 Pieces of Fiction to Inspire Productivity
With 2016 beginning in earnest and resolutions being made, you may be looking for a way to make your leisure time a little more productive and guilt-free. To that end, there are some excellent pieces of fiction that provide more than just entertainment; they also inspire productivity. These are just a few titles that can motivate and energize you as you set new objectives for the year ahead.
When did ‘buccaneering’ become a good word?
UK Prime Minister David Cameron wants Britain to be a “buccaneering, trading, investing nation right around the world”. But despite the word’s roots, he doesn’t mean the UK is a nation of thieves and murderers, writes Trevor Timpson.
Buccaneers were the classic Caribbean pirates.
They were horribly violent, ruthless robbers. Edward Teach, known as Blackbeard, went into battle with pieces of burning slow match stuck in his filthy, matted beard and hair.
To some the word still means someone who greedily grabs what they want by force. “Buccaneer capitalism” was blamed by some for the financial crisis of 2008.
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The Vocabularist: Where did the word ‘crisis’ come from?
Barely a week passes without something being referred to as a crisis. But what makes a crisis a crisis, asks Trevor Timpson.
The Greek word krino meant separate, judge or decide, and from it came the nouns krites “judge” – from which we get critic, and kriterion, a test to judge by.
The related word “krisis” signified the preference of one alternative over another. The Day of Judgement is hemera kriseos, in the Greek New Testament – truly a crisis for those at risk of damnation.
The Vocabularist: Which came first, cake or pyramid?
‘News that Egypt’s pyramids are to be scanned by radiation brings to mind an odd suggestion about where the word came from.
We get both “pyramid” and “obelisk” from Greek, in which obelisk also means skewer, and pyramid can be a kind of bun or cake, probably made of wheat flour and honey.
So it is sometimes said that Greek visitors named these grand Egyptian monuments in fun, like London’s Gherkin and Cheese-grater, after familiar little items.’
The Vocabularist: Keep pushing the envelope
‘Vladimir Putin’s Syria policy is among the things that have recently been referred to as “pushing the envelope”. But where did “velop” come from?
In English, “envelop” and similar words to do with covering or containing arrived from France in the Middle Ages.
Earlier than that, the origins of the early French word “voloper” are murky – the Latin volvere – meaning to roll – may figure in its ancestry, or possibly a Germanic word related to English “wrap”.’
The Vocabularist: Nerve-racking or nerve-wracking?
‘If something makes you very anxious is it nerve-racking or nerve-wracking?
The first recorded use of nerve-racking is in a letter by the poet Shelley in 1812, telling his friend he is glad to be away from the “nerve-racking and spirit-quelling metropolis”.
But “rack” – from a family of English words to do with stretching – had long been used in connection with torture, and often applied to parts of the body.’
English at Ken Stimpson 