Mountain range

by Robert Hendrickson

The newest addition to the American Regional Expressions series (Whistlin' Dixie, Happy Trails, and Yankee Talk), Mountain Range introduces readers to the vernacular of the Ozarks, the Blue Ridge Mountains, the Smokies, the Cumberlands, and of course Appalachia. What many people may not know is that there is much more to the rich culture and language of these regions than Hollywood caricatures like the Beverly Hillbillies and Ma Kettle suggest. Linguist Robert Hendrickson provides a revealing glimpse into a dialect that, according to Mario Pei, "comes closer in many respects to Elizabethan English than does present speech of London." Excerpted from novels, poetry, legends, newspapers, and other sources, Mountain Range contains thousands of expressions, anecdotes, pronunciations, and idioms that will entertain and enlighten you about life "down in the holler."