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Why 'Beyoncé' is the perfect word to add to the French dictionary

“I’m not bossy, I’m the boss”: a characteristically skilful sentence from the singer-songwriter and businesswoman Beyoncé, who used it in a...

Susie Dent

It’s not often that a new addition to the dictionary makes my heart sink. I’ve spent decades on the side of evolution, greeting every new word as...

Few dictionary definitions in recent memory were as hotly anticipated as the one for “Brexit”, which in 2016 had us all desperate for an escape...

A few years ago, academics at the University of London confirmed what West Country farmers have suspected for years: that cows have an accent. The...

Crapulence. It’s a word to conjure with, and it may be one you need. Born in the 18th century, it is defined in the Oxford English Dictionary as...

London’s buses are having to take special care this week, as more and more people are thrown under them in the course of the Covid-19 inquiry. ...

“Secrecy is the first essential in affairs of state.” The French statesman Cardinal Richelieu, a powerhouse of 17th-century France, knew what it...