I love this stuff. Language, speech, still an enigma to some degree even after our wandering this rock for as long as we have. Tom Wolfe takes a crack of the beauty of this aspect with this “The Kingdom of Speech.”
I do like Tom Wolfe, so reader beware I’m probably biased. This is a short book, readable in a few hours, and is worth it for several reasons. First, the recap of Darwin and his adventures. Class society, Wallace the “flycatcher,” how history was rewritten and the drama that caused over the centuries.
Wolfe also takes a shot a Noam Chomsky, which is kinda rare in my world, so I admire the fact Wolfe didn’t pull punches. Where did speech come from? How did it evolve over time and are all of us humans living under the same rules? (Just watch a Trump speech to answer that question.)
Get it, read it.