A Word for All Seasons

A fascinating collection of seasonal words and phrases exploring their origins and the development of meaning over time.

Silly season, spring chicken, Shrovetide, dog days, Halloween, wassail, Snowtober, Hogmanay and over 100 other words and phrases are brought together here to show how seasonal vocabulary has become one of the most productive areas of the English lexicon. Words associated with spring, summer, autumn or fall and winter, along with season itself, have long been used creatively in such worlds as commerce, politics and the arts; music and painting especially provide famous cases of the popular appeal of the ‘four seasons’.The entries in this book, alongside idioms, extracts from poetry and exquisite engravings by Eric Ravilious, demonstrate how these words and phrases have spread throughout the language.

Each entry gives an account of historical origins, tracing the development of meaning over time, and conclu