Recently I’ve reviewed a couple of small dictionaries, and I thought I might keep going and recommend one of the best little dictionaries on my shelf.
It’s called Room’s Dictionary of Confusibles and was written by Adrian Room (an English lexicographer who went on to become the main editor of the great Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable in all its forms).
This book was published in 1979, but you can still find on any of the second-hand bookselling sites (such as ABE books—when I checked, they had many copies on sale from $6:81 upwards).
What this brilliant little book does is to list pairs of words that many people (most people?) tend to get confused about.
Here are some examples: ‘founder/flounder’ (do you know the difference? To ‘flounder’ is to struggle while to ‘founder’ means to sink); ‘obstinate/obdurate’ (making the careful difference between being unyielding and being hardened); ‘blatant/flagrant’ (or can you be blatantly flagrant?); ‘enquire/inquire’ (as Adrian Room wisely says most dictionaries make no distinction between the two—so don’t let the pedants nag about these two); ‘magnificent/munificent’ (I supposed someone might be magnificently munificent?); ‘billion/million’ (important in our inflationary world); ‘mincemeat/minced meat’ (yes, there is a difference); ‘mortuary/morgue’ (two words that are dead similar); ‘nefarious/felonious’ (both of which sound pretty bad); and hundreds more.
With these easily confused words we often stumble—sometimes because we don’t want to be thought ill-educated—and so we end up avoiding them rather than being wrong.
Not necessary.
We can use the right word.
Sometimes, as Adrian Room says in his introduction to this book, one word somehow suggests another—and so creates a link in most people’s minds.
This is the sort of little dictionary that (in my experience) can be a delight to read in bed (or in the bathtub or on the beach).
Or it can be a good ‘dipping’ book—one where you slowly flip the pages and then stop to read anything that catches your attention.
So, if you are a dictionary person (like me) this might be one for you.
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BY THE WAY...
If you'd like to see my A-Z list of Aussie slang, you'll find it here in the Australian Geographic website -- A-Z list of Aussie slang. Here’s the link: The A-Z of Aussie slang - Australian Geographic
The liveliest part of this website is usually the Q and A page -- be sure to check it out from time to time.
