Alive as Life. About the Russian Language

We no longer hear in cafes and restaurants the once popular word frishtikat; we slowly forget that satellites may not be related to space; only a few will remember what ZAGS stands for; and absolutely no one, when saying: This amazed me, thinks of the hero's helmet. Any living language is forever in motion, forever growing, and the Russian language is as alive as life. Kornei Ivanovich Chukovsky 1882–1969 gifted children many wonderful fairy tales, and to those who care about the history and fate of the Russian language, this book. We all, Kornei Ivanovich says, must fight to ensure that our language does not become 'dead as death.' Thus, this book is not just a collection of linguistic observations and anecdotes, but also an engaging analysis of questions that are still debated today. How to preserve the purity and imagery of the Russian language? Do borrowings and jargon spoil it? And why are bureaucratic expressions the most terrible and dangerous ailment threatening the Russian language?