The Mother Lode

My love of words comes from my mother. She was a bit of a radical for her times: she wanted to go into business. Her father assured her, though, that there was no place for women in business, so in the end she majored in English instead.

My upbringing and education consequently included a lot of inserted commas and exhortations to stop being "facetious" or acting like a "termagant." In addition, we were forbidden to say "shut up" or "ain't." These rules, much to my embarrassment, extended to guests as well.


My mother's dictionary, which she had purchased in the '30s when she went to college, and saw no need whatsoever to update, was a Webster's. Eventually I found "termagant" on one of its gilt-edged pages and learned I had been (unjustly) labeled a "shrew."

I was not actually seduced into buying a dictionary on my own until the appearance of the 4th edition of the "American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language" in 2006. Launched at the American Booksellers Association's Book Expo of that year, the display copy had a bevy of sales reps hovering over it like anxious mothers, longing for praise but loathe to let anyone too near.

It is beautiful. With illuminated headings for each letter, color illustrations and extensive etymologies, I think it is the perfect home dictionary. My mother found it yet another example of misguided youthful enthusiasm.

I say "home" dictionary because the "real" dictionary of our language is to be found only at your library. The Oxford English Dictionary, currently at 20 volumes, plus extras for "new words," is, of course, the standard. Nowadays, much of it is available online, but the print version retains a certain cachet that cannot yet be duplicated, no matter how useful the online version may be.

Simon Winchester told the story of the first OED in his 1998 best-seller "The Professor, the Madman, and the Dictionary" and filled in the blank spots with "The Meaning of Everything: The Story of the Oxford English Dictionary" in 2003. Winchester is a marvelous storyteller, but it must be said that he had amazing material to work with. Many of the original "drudges" who produced this 12-volume marvel died before it was published.

I was thinking about this because of a new book, "How to Read a Word," by Elizabeth Knowles. Knowles is a historical lexicographer and senior editor for Oxford. Her little book offers exactly what its title suggests, explaining how to understand a dictionary entry, how such an entry is produced, and where to go afterward for more.

Knowles is an insider and she provides a wealth of useful information for the word-afflicted. She is not boring, but perhaps a bit ponderous. A lighter look at the language and its recorders may be found in "Reading the OED: One Man, One Year, 21,730 Pages" by Ammon Shea.

Yes, Shea did read the OED. Not a light undertaking, but Shea is a dictionary lover, not a lexicographer. Reading dictionaries has always been part of his life. Writing a book about it is different.

The book can be read in an evening, if desired. There is a chapter for each letter of the alphabet and each contains Shea's favorite words beginning with that letter. Though favorite words are very personal things, Shea's annotations are clever and entertaining.

I enjoyed the openings he provided for each chapter even more. These explore the history and mechanics of lexicography, and the experiences, good and bad, to be had whilst reading a work of 21,730 pages, primarily in the basement of a library. My favorite was chapter "F," where he explains why he is not reading the OED on a computer, despite appreciating the usefulness of that tool.

Shea says that it wasn't until he was finished that he realized why he had started reading the OED in the first place. "I had hoped that within its pages I would find everything I had ever looked for in a novel: joy and sorrow, laughter and frustration, and the excitement and contentment that is unique to great storytelling. The OED exceeded all of these hopes and expectations. It is the greatest story I've ever read."

My mother is 93 now, 10 years into a diagnosis of Alzheimer's. Her journey down this path has been, for the most part, a relatively easy one. She is uniformly described as "happy." Where I see pain is in her loss of vocabulary. She starts a sentence and then stops, a look of panic flitting across her face. Another favorite word is gone.

Photo by Tristan Ferne (Creative Commons)