Reading the OED One Man, One Year, 21,730 Pages |
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| Author:
| Shea, Ammon |
| ISBN: | 978-0-670-07337-5 |
| Publication Date: | Oct 2008 |
| Publisher: | Penguin Random House
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| Imprint: | Viking |
| Book Format: | Hardback |
| List Price: | AUD $29.95 |
Book Description:
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From Abluvion to Zyxt - a yearlong account of reading the greatest dictionary in the world and plundering its treasures-
Apricity(n.)The warmth of the sun in winter.
Constult(v.)To act stupidy together.
Obaginate(v.)To annoy by repeating over and over and over and over.
Somnificator(n.)One who induces sleep in others.
Wine-knight(n.)A person who drinks valiantly.
The word...
More Description
From Abluvion to Zyxt - a yearlong account of reading the greatest dictionary in the world and plundering its treasures-
Apricity(n.)The warmth of the sun in winter.
Constult(v.)To act stupidy together.
Obaginate(v.)To annoy by repeating over and over and over and over.
Somnificator(n.)One who induces sleep in others.
Wine-knight(n.)A person who drinks valiantly.
The word lover's Mount Everest, the Oxford English Dictionaryhas enthralled logophiles since it's initial publication eighty years ago. Weighing in at 62 kilograms, it is the dictionary to end all dictionaries.
Who would set out to read this massive work in its entriety? Only a man as obsessed, coffee-fuelled, and verbally inclined as Ammon Shea. In twenty-six chapters maked by a documentarian's keen eye and filled with sharp wit and sheer delight, Shea shares his year inside the OED, delivering a hair-pulling, eye-crossing account of reading every word, and compiling the most obscure, hilarious, oddly useful, and exquisitely useless gems he discovers along the way.
Filled with lexicographical revelations and miscellaneous marinalia, Reading the OEDis a feast for word lovers.