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1993-04-08
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REVIEWS, Page 66BOOKSSatisfying Verbomania
By JESSE BIRNBAUM
TITLE: ROGET'S INTERNATIONAL THESAURUS
EDITOR: Robert L. Chapman
PUBLISHER: HarperCollins; 1,141 pages; $16.95
THE BOTTOM LINE: What's the good word? It can be found in
the new fifth edition of this classic desk companion.
"Thesaurus" is a mouthful; it does not roll trippingly on
the tongue. Nor do its plural forms, the highfalutin thesauri,
or thesauruses, which sounds like a prehistoric creature.
Thesaurus means treasury or storehouse, but nobody calls
Nicholas Brady Secretary of the Thesaurus or says, "Dear, pack
up your winter underwear and lock it in the thesaurus."
That is because that word is forever linked to Peter Mark
Roget, the man who practically invented it. An English physician
and lifelong logophile, Roget was 73 in 1852 when he published
his Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases, Classified and
Arranged so as to Facilitate the Expression of Ideas and Assist
in Literary Composition. Today Roget's International Thesaurus
still hews to its promise. It is the best of its kind, a
veritable arsenal of words and phrases with their synonyms,
antonyms and related terms, all classified and organized to help
writers and speakers say clearly what they mean.
The fourth edition of Roget's was published in 1977, but
the English vocabulary has so ballooned since then that a fifth
was necessary. At $16.95 for 325,000 words and phrases, the new
Roget's is a bargain. Lexicographer Robert L. Chapman has
revised and reordered many of Roget's 1,000 or so mainly
abstract category headings (Existence, Relation, Quantity) and
made them more accessible. To these he has added 31 new topics,
including Fitness, Exercise, Substance Abuse, Space Travel,
Computer Science and the Environment (listing more than 100
pollutants), though some of these are rearrangements and
expansions derived from previous editions.
Chapman has further simplified the quest for the precise
word by placing certain terms in useful vertical order, rather
than running them in dense paragraphs. Thus about 150 manias,
in riveting variety, are listed both by subject (railroad
travel: siderodromomania; crossing bridges: gephyromania) and
by name (trichorrhexomania: pinching off one's hair; typomania:
writing for publication). Similarly organized is a catalog of
more than 200 phobias, which only begins to suggest why
psychiatrists will never lack for patients. Fear of the Pope is
papaphobia; fear of failure, kakorraphiaphobia; fear of the
flute, aulophobia.
Roget's also brims with the latest cliches and dirty words
and an up-to-date compilation of slang and jargon; but it makes
no pretense at distinguishing between the useful and the awful.
Where the fourth edition labels slang as such, the fifth
prefers "nonformal," an ambiguous term at best. The innocent
"flaky" is nonformal -- but so is the vulgar "screw." The Black
English verb "dis" (short for disrespect) is nonformal; so is
"deep doo-doo," slang for predicament. What is even more
puzzling is Roget's failure to draw distinctions between the
"nonformal" and the downright unacceptable. The fourth cites
certain words as derogatory; the fifth does not. It lists such
pejoratives as "spade," "nigger," "honky," "redskin," "gook" and
"slant-eye" as nonformal and altogether ignores other, similar
terms.
But the function of this book is not that of a guide to
good usage or a dictionary, though it is a necessary complement
to both. Despite its peculiar shortcomings, it remains a
sterling reference tool and deserves a bravo!, bravissimo!, well
done!, ole! (Sp), bene! (Ital), hear, hear!, aha!; hurrah!;
good!, fine!, excellent!, whizzo! (Brit), great!, beautiful!,
swell!, good for you!, good enough!, not bad!, now you're
talking!; way to go, attaboy!, attababy!, attagirl!, attagal!,
good boy!, good girl!; that's the idea!, that's the ticket!;
encore!, bis!, take a bow!, three cheers!, one cheer more!,
congratulations!
Also, hail!