Chambers French Dictionary has a respectable lineage as Harrap's Shorter French (1st ed., 1940, 1944, 2 v.), described by all the blurbs as “France's favourite bilingual French and English dictionary for nearly seven decades”. This re‐named edition (an extra title page proclaims the 9th ed. of Harrap's Shorter) represents the eighth revision and includes the most recent coinages and colloquialisms among its 375,000 words and 500 common English and French idioms (up by 100 since the Harrap's shorter 7th ed. of 2004) (RR 2005/250).
I was soon reminded why the original was published in two volumes – the problem is that the work is simply too heavy for the flimsiness of the binding. My copy parted company from its spine after a mere three weeks of light use. This is an occupational hazard with dictionaries of course, but it never fails to irritate, particularly when one looks at the excellent binding of the The Chambers [English] Dictionary (11th ed., 2008) (RR 2009/220) which costs a mere £5 more than this work.
One of the obvious questions in relation to a new version of a work of this kind is how it compares with its rivals (in this case the Oxford‐Hachette and the HarperCollins Robert dictionaries), and the answer must be that they are all much of a muchness, although I prefer the look and layout of this text to that of the others. There are signs of occasional carelessness; to take a simple example, the fresh‐water fish “ablette” (designated “Ich.” which is better than the more general “zool.” of earlier editions) is “bleak” in English (I did not know that either). But there is no corresponding entry under “bleak”, and here the two others score against Chambers.
Although designed primarily as a British‐English reference tool, the dictionary gives American equivalents and compounds (such as “crosstown”), and on the French side any Swiss, Belgian or Canadian variants. Words with more than one application are highlighted in blue and a box contains the explanations. Hyphens are disregarded in filing. Blue highlighting is used for negatives, contracted forms and false friends in English or French depending on the slant (“note that the French word pétulant is a false friend … never a translation for petulant – it means exuberant”). Concerned especially with current usage, it tends to avoid archaic terms (except when deliberately revamped as contemporary slang). For instance, the French gloss on “obéissance” is much more informative than the English gloss on “obedience” which does not point to its false friend “obédience”, and the English “obeisance” is not listed. The advantages of a ready‐reference source to contemporary speech are obvious, and it is useful to know the French for clingfilm, but it is often at the expense of slightly older forms, and of course some of these neologisms date very quickly. While we all know what an hôtelier is in either language, it is a shame not to see its older variant “guestmaster”, and the new art of whistle‐blowing is considered worthier of inclusion than the (surely more enjoyable) one of “wetting one's whistle”. To find either of these, one must revert to the trusty Harrap's Standard. While not derogating from the traditional concerns of lexicography, the dictionary seems to stress the idiomatic and lighter‐hearted slang elements. Sartorial expressions unknown to this reviewer were “muffin top” and “wardrobe malfunction” – the French translations are rather laborious. It is sound, as ever, on grammar (for example the distinctions between disinterested and uninterested, lie and lay, which most English speakers seem unaware of) and has a useful word‐building feature.
The “World of work” section covers all the necessary ground including advice for learners seeking a job in a Francophone country and business correspondence. The “Living language” section (divided into sections on Opinions, Emotions and Communication and corresponding to the “Language in use” section of Harper Robert) is very good; it makes one wonder how people managed without these features in the older editions. We are given common texting abbreviations and email etiquette in both languages, as well as the trickier points of telephonic conversation and the most common abbreviations in advertisements, both classified and personal. It is interesting to contrast the most used abbreviations and muse on their social implications – the Anglophone gsoh or nd/sd (non‐drinking/non‐smoking) and the Francophone “ss enf” (sans enfants) and “bon niv soc” (niveau social).
Chambers French Dictionary is reasonably priced and well worth having, but it really needs to be properly bound.
