There’s a concept known as “grammar Nazi,” even covered on Wikipedia. It started as an internet meme and refers to people who are extremely meticulous about language accuracy. Naturally, it has no actual connection to Nazism or fascism, though the joke went far enough that an emblem, based on Nazi symbolism, was created for the term (and rumor has it this even led to law enforcement issues).
But the term has taken root, and people often use it in conversation—when correcting someone, they might say they’re a “grammar Nazi” and thus don’t tolerate such mistakes.
I was naturally lucky; Russian came easily to me in school, even though I didn’t study the rules all that much. I have an internal sense of the language. Over time, I’ve always been interested in the meanings of rare words and in which words people most commonly misuse. I even corrected some of my own speech mistakes as soon as I learned about them.
Then, just the other day, I stumbled upon a book called 50 Deadly Sins in the Russian Language, with a bold cover to boot. Naturally, I couldn’t resist picking it up.
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