The English language can be a very silly thing, as anyone who has read many children’s books (or newspaper headlines) will tell you without hesitation. We don’t know about you, but we’ve always delighted in the weirdnesses, coincidences, contradictions, and — let’s face it — puns inherent in our mother tongue. So of course, we dove right into the just-released book Tyrannosaurus Lex: The Marvelous Book of Palindromes, Anagrams, and Other Delightful and Outrageous Wordplay , by philosophy professor and author Rod L. Evans. In it, Evans leads us through the world of logology — the study of word puzzles — pointing out everything from “aptly scrambled words” to oxymora to “kangaroo” words that carry their offspring inside of them.
Click through to check out one of the interludes from the book, a near-exhaustive list of authors whose names are a little too appropriate for their subjects, and let us know your favorite of the bunch in the comments!
Authors Whose Homophonic Names Sound Curiously Related to Their Subjects
Jane Arbor wrote The Cypress Garden (Winnipeg, Canada: Harlequin Books, 1969).
Claude Balls wrote Shy Men, Sex, and Castrating Women (Trexlertown, PA: Polemic Press, 1985).
William Battie wrote A Treatise on Madness (London: J. Whis- ton and B. White, 1758).
Cyril Berry wrote Winemaking with Canned and Dried Fruit (Andover, UK: Amateur Winemaker, 1968).
Clara Louise Burnham wrote The Inner Flame: A Novel (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1912).
Geoff Carless wrote Motorcycling for Beginners (East Ardsley, UK: EP Publishing, 1980).
J. N. Chance wrote The Abel Coincidence (London: Robert Hale, 1969).
W. Chappell wrote The Preacher; or, The Art and Method of Preaching (London: Edward Farnham, 1656).
William A. Christian wrote Oppositions of Religious Doc- trines (London: Macmillan, 1972).
Edward H. Clinkscale wrote A Musical Offering (New York: Pendragon Press, 1977).
Douglas J. Cock wrote Every Other Inch a Methodist (London: Epworth Press, 1988).
Elizabeth Dyer wrote Textile Fabrics (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1923).
Harry Belleville Eisberg wrote Fundamentals of Arctic and Cold Weather Medicine and Dentistry (Washington, DC: Research Division, Bureau of Medicine and Surgery, 1949).
Frank Finn wrote The Boy’s Own Aquarium (London: Country Life and George Newnes, 1922).
Paul J. Gillete wrote Vasectomy: The Male Sterilization (New York: Paperback Library, 1972).
John Goodbody wrote The Illustrated History of Gymnastics (New York: Beaufort Books, 1983).
William I. Grossman wrote A Primer of Gross Pathology (Springfield, IL: Thomas, 1972).
Roger Grounds wrote The Perfect Lawn (London: Ward Lock, 1974).
Norman Knight wrote Chess Pieces (London: Sampson Low, 1949).
A. Lord wrote The Grace of God (Truro, UK: James R. Nether- ton, 1859).
G. A. Martini wrote Metabolic Changes Induced by Alcohol (Berlin: Springer Verlag, 1971).
L. G. Chiozza Money wrote Riches and Poverty (London: Methuen, 1908).
Jack Roy Strange wrote Abnormal Psychology: Understanding Behavior Disorders (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1965).
Mary Twelveponies wrote There Are No Problem Horses, Only Problem Riders (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1982).
[Reprinted from Tyrannosaurus Lex by Rod Evans by arrangement with Perigee, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc., Copyright (c) 2012 by Rod Evans.]