By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
‘The Argonauts of the Air’ is a short story by H. G. Wells (1866-1946), first published in Phil May’s Annual in 1895. The story is another of Wells’s prophetic tales, anticipating the Wright Brothers’ first powered flight in a heavier-than-air craft eight years later, at Kitty Hawk in 1903.
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
What does the word ‘tantalise’ have to do with the chemical element ‘tantalum’? And what is the connection of both of these to the figure of Tantalus from Greek mythology? The etymology of the word ‘tantalise’ is bound up with a mythical king and a curious story about a punishment he was forced to suffer. So let’s take a look at the story of King Tantalus and how this relates to an everyday word we use to describe the act of teasing someone with something that always remains just out of reach.
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
‘The Sea-Raiders’ is a short story by H. G. Wells (1866-1946), first published in the Weekly Sun Literary Supplement on 6 December 1896. In the story, the titular ‘sea-raiders’ are a species of creatures resembling octopuses.
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
What are the origins of the word ‘Babel’, and what does it have to do with two similar-sounding words: ‘Bible’ and ‘babble’?
The word ‘Babel’ – capitalised to show that it has not managed to shake off its origins as a proper name – is defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as ‘a confused or disordered medley of sounds, esp. of voices’. But where did the word ‘Babel’ come from?
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
What does the word ‘antediluvian’ mean, and what are its origins? To discover the answers to these questions, we have to travel back to the Old Testament, and to one of the most famous stories found in the Book of Genesis.