Dictionaries 19this desk dictionary offers more than 200,000 entries, and among its special
features are full-color illustrations and an abundance of illustrative quotations.
The Oxford English Dictionary (2nd edition, 20 vols.), or OED, is the greatest
wordbook of our language and its foremost historical dictionary. Here you
will find thousands of words explained in exhaustive entries tracing their use
and meaning from Chaucer’s day to our own. The Oxford English Dictionary
Online (www.oed.com) includes all the material in the print edition as well as
yearly additions and numerous new entries, as well as revisions of old ones.
subject dictionaries
Dictionaries that concentrate on the vocabulary of particular subjects or fields
of study are widely available. The following are some examples.
Although there are many crossword puzzle aficionados who would shud-
der at the thought of consulting a dictionary (or using a pencil), there are
probably just as many who don’t mind getting a little help now and then.
Crossword puzzle dictionaries may well be their reference work of choice.
The Random House Webster’s Crossword Puzzle Dictionary (4th edition) provides
thousands of clues as well as answer words. One Across.com (www.oneacross
.com) is an online tool that allows the puzzler to plug in the known letters,
indicate spaces, and receive a list of possible word choices.
The “poet who doesn’t know it” might be in need of a rhyming dictio nary.
One popular title is Words to Rhyme With: A Rhyming Dictionary; Including a
Primer of Prosody, a List of More Than 80,000 Words That Rhyme, a Glossary
Defining 9,000 of the More Eccentric Rhyming Words, and a Variety of Exemplary
Verses, One of Which Does Not Rhyme at All. Entries in this comprehensive
source are filed by rhyming sound rather than spelling. Would-be poets in
cyberspace can turn to RhymeZone (www.rhymezone.com), which provides
rhyming words, synonyms, definitions, and more.
Too many cooks might spoil the broth, but there aren’t too many who
won’t find The New Food Lover’s Companion (4th edition) to be a useful kitchen
aid. More than 6,000 alphabetically arranged entries cover cooking tools,
terms, and techniques. An appendix provides seventy pages of helpful kitchen
information (equivalents, substitutions, conversion formulas, etc.). A bibliog-
raphy of cookbooks tops off this delightful dictionary. Cybercooks will find
more than 4,000 terms from an earlier edition of this work at Food Dictionary
(www.epicurious.com/tools/fooddictionary/).