The Metaphor Zoo: Why the English Language Loves Animals

Ever wondered why it rains cats and dogs? Why some are early birds and others night owls? Or why on earth a cat would wear pyjamas?
'Charming, scholarly, boisterously playful, thoroughly engaging.' Benjamin Dreyer, bestselling author of Dreyer's English

English is home to a veritable menagerie of animal metaphors, similes, sayings, adages, proverbs, idioms and rhymes, ranging from the commonsense to the utterly absurd. From curious cats to mindless sheeple, lexicographer Jeremy Butterfield t...