Henry Watson Fowler in the context of "Ernest Gowers"

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⭐ Core Definition: Henry Watson Fowler

Henry Watson Fowler (10 March 1858 – 26 December 1933) was an English schoolmaster, lexicographer and commentator on the usage of the English language. He is notable for both A Dictionary of Modern English Usage and his work on the Concise Oxford Dictionary, and was described by The Times as "a lexicographical genius".

After an Oxford education, Fowler was a schoolmaster until his middle age and then worked in London as a freelance writer and journalist, but was not very successful. In partnership with his brother Francis, beginning in 1906, he began publishing seminal grammar, style and lexicography books. After his brother's death in 1918, he completed the works on which they had collaborated and edited additional works.

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šŸ‘‰ Henry Watson Fowler in the context of Ernest Gowers

Sir Ernest Arthur Gowers (/ˈɔaʊ.ərz/; 2 June 1880 – 16 April 1966) was a British civil servant and author who is best remembered for his book Plain Words, first published in 1948, and his revision of Fowler's classic Modern English Usage. Before making his name as an author, he had a long career in the Civil Service, which he entered in 1903. His final full-time appointment was as Senior Regional Commissioner for Civil Defence, London Region (1940–45). After the Second World War, he was appointed chairman of numerous government inquiries, including the 1949 Royal Commission into Capital Punishment. He was also chairman of the Harlow New Town Development Corporation.

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Henry Watson Fowler in the context of Francis George Fowler

Francis George Fowler (1871–1918) was an English writer on English language, grammar and usage.

Born in Tunbridge Wells, Fowler was educated at Peterhouse, Cambridge. He lived on Guernsey in the Channel Islands. He and his older brother, Henry Watson Fowler, wrote The King's English together, an influential book published in 1906. Later they worked on what became Fowler's Modern English Usage, but before it was finished, Francis died of tuberculosis, picked up during his service with the British Expeditionary Force in World War I. He was 47 years old.

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Henry Watson Fowler in the context of The King's English

The King's English is a book on English usage and grammar. It was written by the brothers Henry Watson Fowler and Francis George Fowler and published in 1906; it thus predates by twenty years Modern English Usage, which was written by Henry alone after Francis's death in 1918.

The King's English is less like a dictionary than Modern English Usage: it consists of longer articles on more general topics, such as vocabulary, syntax, and punctuation and draws heavily on examples from many sources throughout. One of its sections is a systematic description of the appropriate uses of shall and will. The third and last edition was published in 1931, by which time Modern English Usage had superseded it in popularity.

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