Let’s Talk English
I thoroughly agree with the writer in the Tablet who protests against the use of pretentious and pseudo-scientific terms when simple everyday phrases are far more expressive. Herr Hitler has, for example, been recently described in the Times as a paranoiac with delusions of persecution, he is aggressive, a megalomaniac with messianic feelings, and the victim of a power impulse for bloodless victories. Why not, as the Tablet suggests, use English, and say that Herr Hitler is a nasty piece of work.
(The Church Times, 3 November 1939, 378)
As far as I know, "a nasty piece of work" doesn't appear in the Authorised Version.
Though perhaps this is an error that needs revising.
(Part of the 'historical bycatch' series; explanation.)
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