Diane S. (rvdreamin) reviewed Partridge's Concise Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English on + 86 more book reviews
Subtitle: From the Work of Eric Partridge
From the covers:
The English language is in a state of perpetual change and "Partridge's Concise Dictionary of Slang and unconventional English" presents a snapshot of its state into the nineties. In this concise edition, Paul Beale continues the tradition begun in Eric Partridge's "A Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English", while making it particularly relevant to our understanding of the language of the present day. More than 1500 new terms have been added - coinages of the 1980s that had not yet come to light when the unabridged edition last went to press in 1983. Like its parent volume, the concise edition provides a account of the vivid, racy, and informative elements of our language, documenting the living history of English and social history of the twentieth century.
As one who has gone a-faring in his day, through the damp and difficult catacombs of lexicography, I can testify that Eric Partridge's new Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English represents a really sickening amount of labor.. It is a serious contribution to a difficult subject and greatly surpasses all its predecessors." H.L. Mencken
This dictionary... is a masterful performance and ought to be acquired by every reader who wants for his library a sound lexicographical foundation. -- Edmund Wilson
The Imaginative possibilities of this book are infinite. Alas that it should bulk too large to be read in bed. -- The Observer.
To browse in it is like eating peanuts: addictive to the extreme... If one must limit an appraisal of Partridge's torrential work to but one adjective, the choice is a breeze: stupendous. -- Encounter
From the covers:
The English language is in a state of perpetual change and "Partridge's Concise Dictionary of Slang and unconventional English" presents a snapshot of its state into the nineties. In this concise edition, Paul Beale continues the tradition begun in Eric Partridge's "A Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English", while making it particularly relevant to our understanding of the language of the present day. More than 1500 new terms have been added - coinages of the 1980s that had not yet come to light when the unabridged edition last went to press in 1983. Like its parent volume, the concise edition provides a account of the vivid, racy, and informative elements of our language, documenting the living history of English and social history of the twentieth century.
As one who has gone a-faring in his day, through the damp and difficult catacombs of lexicography, I can testify that Eric Partridge's new Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English represents a really sickening amount of labor.. It is a serious contribution to a difficult subject and greatly surpasses all its predecessors." H.L. Mencken
This dictionary... is a masterful performance and ought to be acquired by every reader who wants for his library a sound lexicographical foundation. -- Edmund Wilson
The Imaginative possibilities of this book are infinite. Alas that it should bulk too large to be read in bed. -- The Observer.
To browse in it is like eating peanuts: addictive to the extreme... If one must limit an appraisal of Partridge's torrential work to but one adjective, the choice is a breeze: stupendous. -- Encounter
