Albert Jack – författare

Did you know that an assassin is a hashish-eater and a yokel a country woodpecker? That Dr Mesmer mesmerised patients back to health or that Samuel Pepys enjoyed a good game of handicap? While we're at it, what have spondulics to do with spines or lawyers with avocados?In It's a Wonderful Word, bestselling author Albert Jack collects over 500 of the strangest, funniest-sounding and most delightful words in the English language, and traces them back to their often puzzling origins. While brushing up on your gibberish or gobbledygook, discover why bastards should resent travelling salesmen, why sheets should remain on tenterhooks and why you should never set down a tumbler before finishing your drink.From blotto to bamboozle and from claptrap to quango, Albert Jack's addictive anecdotes bring the world's most colourful language to life and are guaranteed to surprise and entertain.

In Pop Goes the Weasel, Albert Jack explores the strange and fascinating histories behind the nursery rhymes we thought we knew, showing that their real meanings are far from innocent.Who were Mary Quite Contrary and Georgie Porgie? How could Hey Diddle Diddle offer an essential astronomy lesson? And if Ring a Ring a Roses isn't about catching the plague, then what is it really about? This ingenious book delves into the hidden meanings of the nursery rhymes and songs we all know so well and discovers all kinds of strange tales ranging from Viking raids to firewalking and from political rebellion to slaves being smuggled to freedom.From the grim true story behind 'Oranges and Lemons' to the deadly secrets of Mary Quite Contrary's garden, and from how Lucy Locket lost more than her pocket to why Humpty Dumpty wasn't egg-shaped at all, Pop Goes the Weasel is a compendium of surprising stories you won't be able to resist passing on to everyone you know.'An irresistible treasure-trove'Daily Mirror'Most of us can still recite the words to nursery rhymes we learned as children, but how many know the real meanings behind our most familiar verses? Albert Jack reveals hidden histories of cannons, courtesans and vengeful queens'Guardian'The history behind nursery rhymes is not only highly specific but often splendidly grim'The TimesAlbert Jack has become something of a publishing phenomenon, clocking up hundreds of thousands of sales with his series of bestselling adventures tracing the fantastic stories behind everyday phrases (Red Herrings and White Elephants), the world's great mysteries (Loch Ness Monsters and Raining Frogs) and nursery rhymes (Pop Goes the Weasel).

Albert Jack's Shaggy Dogs and Black Sheep is a compulsively readable, highly enlightening look at the phrases we use all the time but rarely consider.The English language is crammed with colourful phrases and sayings that we use without thinking every day. It's only when we're asked who smart Alec or Holy Moly were, where feeling 'in the pink' or 'once in a blue moon' come from, or even what letting the cat out of the bag really means that we realize that there's far more to English than we might have thought.Luckily enough, we now have Albert Jack. And rather than resting on his laurels after the enormous success of Red Herrings and White Elephants, he has continued his search around the world, exploring the origins of hundreds more phrases. The fascinating stories he has uncovered come from the rich traditions of the navy, army and law to confidence tricksters and highwaymen, from the practices of ancient civilizations to Music Hall and pubs. Determined to chase each shaggy dog story to the bitter end, his discoveries are even stranger and more memorable this time round. From the skin of your teeth to the graveyard shift - you'll never speak (or even think) English in the same way again.Albert Jack has become something of a publishing phenomenon, clocking up hundreds of thousands of sales with his series of bestselling adventures tracing the fantastic stories behind everyday phrases (Red Herrings and White Elephants), the world's great mysteries (Loch Ness Monsters and Raining Frogs) and nursery rhymes (Pop Goes the Weasel).

This is a book for everyone who has ever wondered why pubs should be called The Cross Keys, The Dew Drop Inn or The Hope and Anchor. You'll be glad to know that there are very good - strange and memorable - reasons behind them all.After much research about (and in) pubs, Albert Jack brings together the stories behind pub names to reveal how they offer fascinating and subversive insights on our history, customs, attitudes and jokes in just the same way that nursery rhymes do. The Royal Oak, for instance, commemorates the tree that hid Charles II from Cromwell's forces after his defeat at Worcester; The Bag of Nails is a corruption of the Bacchanals, the crazed followers of Bacchus, the god of wine and drunkenness; The Cat and the Fiddle a mangling of Catherine La Fidele and a guarded gesture of support for Henry VIII's first, Catholic, wife Catherine of Aragon; plus many, many more. Here too are even more facts about everything from ghosts to drinking songs to the rules of cribbage and shove ha'penny, showing that, ultimately, the story of pub history is really the story of our own popular history.

Did you know that the Cornish pasty was invented to protect tin miners from arsenic poisoning, or that the word 'salary' comes from Roman soldiers being paid their wages in salt? Why do we eat goose (or turkey) at Christmas? Is the Scotch egg actually from Scotland and what did some retired crusaders have to do with French toast? Who was the original Earl Grey and what sauce was inspired by Parliament? What dish was invented by Greek bandits on the run? Why were hot cross buns seen as magical and what's so rebellious about a haggis or medicinal about a gin and tonic? Did you know what the romantic history is behind the Bakewell Pudding?Albert Jack tells the strange tales behind our favourite dishes and drinks and where they come from (not to mention their unusual creators). In the colourful, wonderful vein of Schott's Food and Drink Miscellany, Albert Jack's What Caesar Did For My Salad is bursting with fascinating insights, characters and enough stories to entertain a hundred dinner parties.Albert Jack is the author such bestselling titles as Pop Goes the Weasel, Shaggy Dogs and Black Sheep, and The Old Dog and Duck.

'Ask a Scotsman for directions and he'll tell you which way to go. Ask an Englishman and he'll try to sell you a map.' Anon'Oats. A grain, which in England is generally given to horses, but in Scotland supports the people. 'Samuel JohnsonIt's 700 years since the Scots and English went head-to-head at the Battle of Bannockburn... and we've been winding each other up ever since. Has there ever been a better time to celebrate seven centuries of love, hatred and indifference?Susan Morrison and Albert Jack offer the view from each side of the border in this hilarious miscellany of Anglo-Scots rivalry, featuring quotes, stories and trivia from Stephen Fry, Bill Bryson, Jimmy Carr, Robert Burns, Billy Connolly, Frankie Boyle, Robert Louis Stevenson, Samuel Johnson and many, many others.