The Concise New Partridge Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English (2nd edition)

Of various names forever associated with particular reference books, Eric Partridge (1894-1979) is among the most prominent for his dictionaries of English slang terms and words. His work began prior to the Second World War and among the dictionaries sitting on a shelf above my left shoulder there is a copy of his 1945 A Dictionary of R.A.F. Slang, complete with his usual lively introduction. While there had been previous dictionaries and compilations of “unconventional English”, his comprehensive and scholarly approach over many decades established his pre-eminence in the field, emphasised by eight editions between 1937 and 1984 of...