Criticism ~ A Book Review of ‘Words of a Feather: A Humorous Puzzlement of Etymological Pairs’ by Murray Suid

Have you ever agreed to review a book and hoped it was good?  Well, Murray Suid sent me his book and I am happy to report that I really did like it.  Although I love words, I'm not much on puzzles, but 'Words of a Feather' was not only a fun read, but educational as well.  It makes a great travel companion in that it is small (thus easy to shove in a purse or backpack) and it contains less than 200 pages.  There are some fun illustrations to boot.  My only complaint, and it is a minor one, is that sometimes the illustrations for the word pairing would be on the backside of the page it demonstrated which if you stop and start reading this book, you lose the humor.

            There were a lot of fascinating pairings including appendix and penthouse, menu and minute, and tradition and treason.  One of my favorites was crisis and criticism. 

            As with people, some words have undeservedly bad reputations.  The pair of words here is a classic example.  Perhaps with the help of etymology, we can improve their status.

            Words typically given as synonyms for crisis include disaster ("great and sudden misfortune"), catastrophe ("bringing overthrow of ruin") and calamity ("deep trouble, misery").  No wonder that many people lose hope when crises occur, whether at the personal level (such as during a midlife crisis) or on the international front.  The good news is that optimism can be found at the etymological root of crisis.  The word comes from the Greek krisis, "turning point," which goes back to the verb krinein, "to discriminate, to weigh, to decide."

            John Kennedy (or one of his speechwriters) caught the true sense of the word in the following: "The Chinese use two brush strokes to write the word crisis.  One brush stroke stands for danger; the other for opportunity.  In a crisis, be aware of the danger - but recognize the opportunity."

            As with crisis, synonyms for criticism are often negative, for example, faultfinding and disapproval.  Yet the origins of criticism trace back to the same Greek root as crisis: krinein. In this context the meaning is "to analyze for the purpose of improving."

            It's true, as Franklin Jones wrote, that "honest criticism is hard to take, particularly from a relative, a friend, an acquaintance, or a stranger."  But in the words of Elbert Hubbard the only way to avoid criticism is to "do nothing, say nothing, be nothing."

          If criticism has a bad rap, it is perhaps because too many professional critics can't resist the fun of putting someone down.  But, of course, I'm not speaking of anyone reviewing this book. (page 57)

            I thought the little touches of self-deprecating humor were nice and made the 'Words of a Feather' more readable.  At the end there are several pages devoted to various resources and websites were amateur etymologists can play around.  Overall, I would recommend this book if you have a hankering for words both fancy and Latin based...you just might learn yourself somethin'.

            Here is the official website. http://www.wordsofafeather.net/

Westerfield © 2009