Amorous or Loving?

How did a marginal dialect spoken in the late ninth century by 200,000 people become the world’s language spoken by 1.6 billion people today?In Amorous or Loving? – The Highly Peculiar Tale of English and the English, Sir Rupert Gavin charts the unique evolution of our language into the resulting hodge-podge that is now the lingua franca of the world. He argues that English is ideal as the global language, not just by accident of history, but by fundamental construction and constitution. Further, he examines how all of this was determined not just by our unique language, but also our geography, our weather, our religion, the extraordinary status of London, and by a handful of inspirational figures – some well-known and some hardly known today at all.

Utterly brilliant! A fascinating deep dive into the history of the English language and all its speakers. Deeply researched and full of extraordinary insights.

Arthur Smith



Exuberant, romantic but packed with forgotten or overlooked facts, Gavin’s book is a celebration of the miracle that is the English language and the history and national temper out of which it grew. It inspires us to value both in a way that Dickens would have understood and relished.

Simon Callow

A highly entertaining, richly personal and extremely loving look at the history of England. Fabulous.

Lucy Worsley

A tour de force! A fascinating journey through what has made the English and their language unique. Full of unexpected discoveries.

Antonia Fraser 

Sir Rupert Gavin has been a central figure in the UK’s cultural, historical, media and business worlds for the last forty years. He has held senior roles in BBC Worldwide, British Telecom, Odeon Cinemas, Historic Royal Palaces, Honours Committee for Arts and Media, National Film and Television School, Contemporary Art Society, and been Master of the Grocers’ Company in the City. He is currently Chairman of the English National Ballet, and the cinema chain The Living Room Cinema. He is a Fellow of the Royal Television Society. He has produced or co-produced over 200 theatre shows in the West End, Broadway or globally, including some of the most ground-breaking work of the last few decades, winning twenty-four Olivier awards for the productions themselves. He was knighted for services to drama, the arts, heritage and the economy in 2023.

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