![]() can be worded by his specifics into creative thought and passion." Ouch. But in practice, "uncritically offering up lists of alternative words" tempts "unthinking and unimpassioned mediocrity into the delusion that its disconnected glimpses of truths. Roget's original goal may have been to make the use of English impeccably exact. The thesaurus was, he declared, "a serious force for bad" in the literary universe. The old-school journalist Simon Winchester, author of a book on the making of the seminal Oxford English Dictionary, launched a withering attack on Roget last year in a massive article in The Atlantic Monthly. Everyone, devotees and detractors alike, agrees that a dictionary is what Roget is not. Just because people can't still find Tamagotchi in the shops doesn't mean they won't feel the need to find them in the book."īut to treat it like a dictionary is to miss the point. "It gets bigger and bigger," says Davidson, "because I didn't take much out. Next week, news-hungry journalists will scour the 1,296 pages of the new edition, looking for neologisms, from Ashtanga yoga to WAP phones. It can take you to places you hadn't even thought of when you began browsing or hunting for a particular word." Even if those places are not necessarily where you want – or have the time – to go. "The joy of Roget is that it's thematic," says its latest editor, George Davidson, the linguistic expert behind the Chambers English Dictionary, Encarta World English Dictionary and the New Penguin English Dictionary, among others. It offers a rhapsodic flight to some other, far more interesting place. The attraction of Roget is that it is far more than a bald compendium of synonyms. At the last count, it had sold 32 million copies. And if that was true of the 15,000 words in his original edition, how much more is it true of the latest, which contains a quarter of a million words? With each succeeding edition, the popularity of the work has increased. All of which showed up in the work that he christened a "thesaurus", borrowing the Greek word for "treasure house". He was also a polymath whose work influenced the discovery of laughing gas as an anaesthetic, the creation of the London sewage system, the invention of the slide rule and the development of the cinema industry – as well as being a chess master and an expert on bees, Dante and the kaleidoscope. There is also a cross-reference – to the category "Words Relating to the Sentiment and Moral Powers", section "Personal Affections", sub-section "Extrinsic Affections" – which offers: " anniversary celebration, solemnization, jubilee, commemoration, ovation, paean, triumph, jubilation triumphal arch, bonfire, salute salvo feu de joie, flourish of trumpets, fanfare, colours flying, illuminations red-letter day trophy Te Deum". Then I might be offered, under the category "Words Expressing Abstract Relations", in the section on "Time", and under the sub-heading "Recurrent Time", the following lattice of connections: " anniversary, jubilee, centenary catamenia courses, menses, menstrual flux rota, cycle, period, stated time, routine feast, fast". ![]() We could even tell the Pewter Society that their drawing (the record on their web site) has an incorrect F (as I have the plate and its real marks).But then suppose I turned to what Dr Roget in 1852 called his Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases, classified and arranged so as to facilitate the expression of ideas and to assist in literary compilation. So this plate - how about that it is made in – say perhaps 1681? – and thus it is, in 2008 - some 327 years old ![]() He died in 1688 – certainly his will was proved then. This is William Haward/Hayward (called himself - William Howard) working 1673 – 1688 in Drury Lane London - you can find who his apprentices were, and that he came from Gloucester and may have been related to other Hawards (whatever spelling) there in Gloucester. W H - the maker - (2 small marks above and one below – just for effect.)Īsk the Pewter Society data Base (what is that? – wait, later.) who is this - and they know! An Early Tudor Alphabet letter small ‘S’ (sometimes known as a Black letter or a Gothic letter – why here? – I haven’t got a clue - but it meant something to -)Ĥ. An animal face – tradition says this is a Leopard’s faceģ. Lion Passant – lion walking across towards the left, there could be a dot of some sort underneath ( aka a lozenge)Ģ. Early Pewterers got into trouble for imitating the goldsmiths and silversmiths by putting (false) Hall Marks on their goods.ġ. Known as Hall Marks (4 of them that look like they were put there separately - rather than altogether) and were likely made by the Maker of the plate.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |