stever@vlsi.caltech.edu@caip.RUTGERS.EDU (02/05/86)
From: stever@vlsi.caltech.edu (Steve Rabin ) In the (good) old days, dictionaries seldom bothered defining the common words of a language - words like: the, a, and, but, for - because "everyone knew what they meant" and it seemed only useful to list and define words whose meanings were somewhat obscure. Today, when the acknowledged function of dictionaries has changed, in keeping with modern linguistic and lexicographical theory, to become "a description of the lexicon of a language", the shorter the dictionary, the greater the proportion of space devoted to the listing, pronouncing, and defining of "the words everyone knows". The Everyday Reader's Dictionary of Misunderstood, Misused, and Mispronounced Words contains what must be a selection based on personal choice: it doesn't pretend to contain every word that people are likely to misunderstand, misuse, or mispronounce and it probably contains words that are quite familiar to some users. Some of the words have been chosen because they have appeared in popular newspapers and magazines, and I thought they were uncommon enough to be included - words like obsecrate, neoteric, nugatory, splenetic, hegemony, exiguous, and flagitious. Others, words like lestobiosis, lyncean, renifleur, fuliginous, ochlesis, oscitant, and nimiety, have been included because their meanings are readily applied in ordinary writing and speaking yet the words themselves are seldom seen or heard. It seemed rather fun to include these. By and large, technical and scientific words have been omitted with the two exceptions of anatomical terms and diseases because it was felt that so much conversation and writing centers on these subjects. The editor would welcome, for future editions of this work, receiving comments on entries and, particularly, on omissions, though the latter should be accompanied by documentary evidence of their use. This is not a succedaneum for satisfying the nympholepsy of nullifidians. Rather it is hoped that the haecceity of this enchiridion of arcane and recondite sesquipedalian items will appeal to the oniomania of an eximious Gemeinschaft whose legerity and sophrosyne, whose Sprachgefuhl and orexis will find more than fugacious fulfillment among its felicific pages. - Forward to the first edition, "New York Times Everyday Reader's Dictionary of Misunderstood, Misused, and Mispronounced Words", by Laurence Urdang. Time Books/Random House. And if you like this, you also might like "Listening to America, An Illustrated History of Words and Phrases from our Lively and Splendid Past", by Stuart Berg Flexner.