Biting the Wax Tadpole
Confessions of a Language Fanatic
When Chinese shopkeepers tried to find a written equivalent of Coca-Cola, one set of characters they chose was pronounced “ke-kou ke-la.” It sounded right, but it literally translated as “bite the wax tadpole.”
Language, like travel, is always stranger than we expect and often more beautiful than we imagine. In Biting the Wax Tadpole Elizabeth Little takes a decidedly unstuffy and accessible tour of grammar via the languages of the world—from Lithuanian noun declensions and imperfective Russian verbs to Ancient Greek and Navajo. And in one of the most courageous acts in the history of popular grammar books, she attempts to provide an explanation of verbal aspect that people might actually understand. Other difficult and pressing questions addressed in Biting…
A graduate of Harvard University, Elizabeth Little is the author of the novel Dear Daughter, as well as the nonfiction books Biting the Wax Tadpole and Trip of the Tongue. Her work has also appeared in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Los Angeles Review of Books, among other publications. She lives in Los Angeles with her family.
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