Henry Hitchings’s book on Samuel Johnson’s mighty Dictionary is so good, so apposite, so chewy and edible, that I felt as if I were rereading it on my first pass.

Henry Hitchings has proved himself a rather skilled conjurer of the Johnsonian spirit. With the right combination of fun and exactitude, he sees why Johnson matters.

Thirteen years ago, Hitchings published an amazingly enjoyable book about the making of Dr Johnson’s Dictionary. Five books later, he has returned to the man he describes as ‘a heroic thinker’… Hitchings himself could be said to provide positive proof of Dr Johnson’s benign influence on the world. As this delightful book goes on, his own aphorisms grow more like Dr Johnson’s… I sometimes found it hard to recall which phrase was coined by H. Hitchings, and which by S. Johnson.

Hitchings is quite an enigma. A writer of apparently limitless learning and intelligence, who writes works of scholarship masquerading as popular narrative non-fiction, he somehow manages to combine what must be marathon stints at the library with a full-time day and night-job as theatre critic of the London Evening Standard. He files a review most days and knocks out a summa every couple of years: the man is something else… An overseer, guardian, wise man, guide.

The sane man’s reaction to the first 50 pages of Henry Hitchings’s account of the evolution of manners in England is one of awe, admiration and submission — awe at the pace and perfection of his prose, admiration for the breadth of his scholarship and submission to the unrelenting volley, the bombardment, the veritable barrage of information.

Hitchings [has] … enviable ability to combine immense scholarly knowledge with entertaining writing… Unashamedly opinionated and funny.

Hitchings has an infectious relish for words.

It is by far the best history of the English language, excitingly and amusingly told in part though striking quotations and entertaining anecdotes. It is based on extensive research, and references a vast number of impressive sources, proving in equal measure history and usage guidebook… Also a splendid example of how to write informatively and wittily on a subject that should be of interest to everyone involved with the English language—by, for instance, speaking and writing it—and indispensable to anyone professionally engaged with it.

Quite how Hitchings has managed to wrestle this dizzying mountain of dense information into such an elegant narrative … is a feat almost as admirable as that of the great lexicographer [Samuel Johnson]. His book is painstakingly detailed, closely argued and suffused with a contagious enthusiasm for the secrets woven into the fabric of our words.

Hitchings tells a good story, but he also cares deeply about intricacy and nuance.

There’s not a word in English that isn’t furled-up history, resonating to some degree with its notorious unfairness and spin. Indeed, to peer into words is to discover dioramas of vanished worlds with model people busily framing meaning to suit their own purposes. I have never read a book that so perfectly reveals those hidden worlds as Henry Hitchings’s The Secret Life of Words.

Hitchings is an excellent companion.

At every stage, the book is about people and ideas on the move, about invasion, refugees, immigrants, traders, colonists and explorers. This is a huge subject and one that is almost bound to provoke question-marks and explosions in the margins—soon forgotten in the book’s sheer sweep and scale … The author’s zest and grasp are wonderful. He makes you want to check out everything . . . Whatever is hybrid, fluid and unpoliced about English delights him.

Gifted and generous… with a wide range of allusion and an eye for the quotable aperçu.