One of the enjoyments of reviewing dictionaries is all the new words you discover, like “fribble” (a trifle), “neodymium” (a rare earth element), “dingus” (a thingumabob) and “rah rah” (uncritically enthusiastic). I am in danger of being a touch rah rah about this dingus though, as the dust cover blurb overwhelms me with hype: “The most useful and authoritative dictionary you can own – for your desk and computer”; “Selected by the Associated Press, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and other leading newspapers as their official dictionary of choice”; “The best dictionary in print”; “The hardest working electronic dictionary and thesaurus”; “We Define Your World”. Wow! No fribble this, more a neodymium.
Noah Webster's first dictionary was published in 1828, but the dictionary reviewed here derives from Webster's New World Dictionary of the American Language of 1951 that was aimed at the college/university market. In 1970 a completely revised Second College Edition was published with a Third College Edition in 1988. This volume is based on, or is (the prefatory matter is unclear) the Fourth College Edition of 1999.
Although billed as a “College” dictionary, I suspect the detail of erudition displayed here will be well “over the heads” of many college students. Thus “fillip” is an “echoic extension of flip”! A what? As in “chirp → chirrup”. More to the point though, is the dense mass of abbreviation, typographic and symbolical porridge that characterize the entries. Apart from the phonetic symbols used for the entry words – such as “n∂ frat' ∂ më” – how about this extract from the “Nes‐tor” entry: “akin to neomal, I return < IE bas*nes –, to unite, be concealed > Goth nasjan, to save, OE nesan, to survive”. I, for one, can do without all this when looking for a meaning. And while finding the syllable markers useful as a guide to pronunciation and articulation, I did find the hyphens getting in the way of scanning and the alphabetical sequence: ness, Ness‐sel‐rode, nest, n'est‐ce pas?
On the plus side, though there is an impressively wide and modern vocabulary, e.g. Frigidaire, i.e. Frigid‐aire; nematode; laicism (“policy and principles opposing clericalism and restructuring the political influence and power of the laity”); Pep rally (a meeting to generate enthusiasm); peppy (full pep of energy); and not forgetting Pepin the Short (AD714?‐768, King of the Franks and Father of Charlemagne)! Also on the “plus” side, the dense page layouts with condensed entries display a large number of entries per page, which makes for quicker scanning.
As in most dictionaries these days, the vocabulary includes proper names, such as Abelard, Pierre: Aberdeen; Aberdeen Angus: Abernathy, Ralph David; Abernaki; Abelian group. There is a scattering of photographs (for famous people) and line drawings to supplement definitions, a samovar and a Spotted Sandpiper bird, for example. Indeed, this dictionary is also a mini‐encyclopedia, a point reinforced by the fact that after the 1699 pages of the dictionary proper there is a 46 page section of reference material including a full colour atlas of the world, the rules of punctuation, geographical tables, scientific and measurement charts, the Declaration of Independence, and the Constitution of the United States of America! A scattering of synonym boxes adds a thesaurus element too.
The prefatory matter contains a detailed guide to the dictionary, a guide to pronunciation and a brief essay on Dictionaries of English. Endpapers give the abbreviations and symbols used in the dictionary, from “abl” (ablative) to “Zool”; many of these are usefully repeated on the inside front and backboards. The pages, although a nice size – midway between A4 and A5 – are, however, virtually margin‐less, and in my copy, some of the bottom lines are dropping off! But, the volume handles well physically.
The dictionary comes with a CD‐ROM, “giving instant access to thousands of definitions, synonyms and antonyms for over 163,000 entries”. Suitable for Microsoft Windows 95 and later, it lets you add notes to definitions, so customizing them to your needs. It allows users to click for a definition or acronym of any word on the screen; to expand a spell‐checker to recognize business terms, place‐names and thousands of new words: and to find the right word, even if you cannot spell it, with the Misspeller's Dictionary.
Undoubtedly, the rich, modern vocabulary, and the focus on definitions make this an important dictionary of American English, but the cluttered and cryptic nature of the entries – the actual definitions can be hard to find – do detract from its usefulness.
