There is such a historical anecdote. Somehow, fierce adherents of the “true Russian” language, insisting that borrowed words are absolutely useless to us, the Slavs, were asked to voice the phrase “A dandy is walking along the boulevard from the theater to the circus” in that very “true Russian” language. And do you know what they did? “The good house is coming through the park from the disgrace on the lists.” As you can see, the experiment failed. You will find out why this did not happen by reading Nigel P. Brown’s wonderful book “The Oddities of Our Language. Interesting linguistics.” Don’t be afraid that this is a translation from English, because the British borrowed exactly the same thing from the ancient Greeks and Romans as you and I. This means that most of them, just like us, do not realize that such familiar words as column, alphabet, clinic, diagnosis, cornice, sex, horoscope, student, style, melodrama, oracle, climate, parapet, space , eccentricity, artifact, currency, history, tome, bacteria and many others, were not invented by us or even by them. The book is intended for everyone who wants to understand the complexities of such a native and beloved Russian language, and most importantly - to find out what attitude to what we say, read and write is shared by the ancient Greeks and no less ancient Romans.