Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of English Usage [Hardcover]

Merriam-Webster (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1, 1994 | ISBN-10: 0877791325 | ISBN-13: 978-0877791324

Objective and comprehensive, Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of English Usage is a readable and entertaining guide to the complext history of some of the thorniest usage issues in the English language. The scholarship and authority of this indispensale work have earned it universal critical acclaim.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

The Merriam brothers desired a continuity of editorship that would link Noah Webster's efforts with their own editions, so they selected Chauncey A. Goodrich, Webster's son-in-law and literary heir, who had been trained in lexicography by Webster himself, to be their editor in chief. Webster's son William also served as an editor of that first Merriam-Webster dictionary, which was published on September 24, 1847.

Although Webster's work was honored, his big dictionaries had never sold well. The 1828 edition was priced at a whopping $20; in 13 years its 2,500 copies had not sold out. Similarly, the 1841 edition, only slightly more affordable at $15, moved slowly. Assuming that a lower price would increase sales, the Merriams introduced the 1847 edition at $6, and although Webster's heirs initially questioned this move, extraordinary sales that brought them $250,000 in royalties over the ensuing 25 years convinced them that the Merriams' decision had been abundantly sound.

The first Merriam-Webster dictionary was greeted with wide acclaim. President James K. Polk, General Zachary Taylor (hero of the Mexican War and later president himself), 31 U.S. senators, and other prominent people hailed it unreservedly. In 1850 its acceptance as a resource for students began when Massachusetts ordered a copy for every school and New York placed a similar order for 10,000 copies to be used in schools throughout the state. Eventually school use would spread throughout the country. In becoming America's most trusted authority on the English language, Merriam-Webster dictionaries had taken on a role of public responsibility demanded of few other publishing companies. 

Product Details

• Hardcover: 992 pages
• Publisher: Merriam-Webster (November 1, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0877791325
• ISBN-13: 978-0877791324
• Product Dimensions: 9.9 x 7.4 x 1.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (32 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #103,581 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #91 in Books > Education & Reference > Dictionaries & Thesauruses > English

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

159 of 167 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Superb research, sound usage information, great value! September 23, 1999

By Geoff Pullum ([e-mail])

Format:Hardcover

This is the finest work of scholarship on English grammar and usage I have ever seen, in thirty years of doing research on English grammar. One grouchy reviewer on this page gives it a one-star put-down and grumbles that it is unreliable, advocating a return to Fowler, or Strunk and White. Don't believe it. The stiff and constricting prescriptions of those older works are in fact often unfounded. The third edition of Fowler (prepared by Burchfield) is not an improvement, and actually gets grammatical points wrong (and I means things like giving examples that are not in fact examples of the point at issue). The Merriam-Webster book is on a different level of scholarship. The example collection is magnificent, the analysis is intelligent and accurate, and where it says something is now acceptable literate usage you can trust it. Of course, if you want silly advice, like "never end a sentence with a preposition" or "never split an infinitive", you won't find it: there are irrational prejudices in the English usage field, and this book lends them no support. But this is because it demands EVIDENCE and ARGUMENT concerning the points it treats; it is not content simply to pass on dogmas and myths from past centuries. I was particularly struck by the fantastic value of this book: Amazon brought it to my door for shipping included -- and this is a 990-page large-format hardback! BUY THIS BOOK. You can't afford not to if you have any serious interest in English grammar.

27 of 29 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Informative and entertaining February 21, 2000

By A Customer

Format:Hardcover

If you want a useful, well-researched guide to the way English is actually used by real creative writers, past and present, buy this book. If you want to be entertained while reading about English grammar (not easily done!), buy this book. If you prefer to blindly follow rigid rules which, rather than reflecting the way the language is actually used, reflect the way some 18th or 19th century usage writers thought it ought to be used, maybe this isn't for you (though I still think you should read it, maybe you'll learn something).

Don't be misled into thinking that this book is simply applying an "everything goes" philosophy. On the contrary, the editors clearly explain and illustrate the way words and phrases are commonly used by writers in Britain and America, and advise you to avoid what is not commonly accepted. They also cite numerous usage writers, whether they agree with them or not (though they quote one writer as saying that if usage writers read more, they would argue less -- an observation that could also apply to some of the reviewers on this page...). They also make clear distinctions between what is acceptable in formal and informal writing. Many of the things that they "permit" (read the entry on permissiveness, by the way) they still recommend be avoided in formal writing.

I don't think that the rules this book skewers represent "the accumulated wisdom of thousands of writers." More accurately, they represent the thinking of a few conservative usage writers (and there's a big difference between usage writers and creative writers -- who would you rather read, Bishop Loweth or Shakespeare?), given added weight by the herd mentality of many generations of grammar teachers. To give one example, grammarians like to insist that "each other" should refer to two people and "one another" should refer to three or more, but as the examples in this book show, it just ain't (fingernails on chalkboard, anyone?) so.

As for "Where's it at?", unfortunately I don't have my copy of the book with me and I don't remember what they had to say about it. I have the pocket version (handy, but lacking the examples and the entertaining discussions), which simply points out that it has been part of American speech for a century (which doesn't imply that it should be used in formal writing). Yes, the dictionary definition of "where" is indeed "in or at what place" but if you go around blindly substituting the dictionary defintion for every word I'm sure you'll discover a lot more seemingly redundant phrases.

This book dicusses the usage history of various words and phrases and gives you examples of how great (and not-so-great) writers throughout history have used them. It gives you clear guidelines rather than setting down rigid rules for you to follow. And if you're obsessed with rules, then maybe you should consider law instead of writing.

38 of 44 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A Book for the Curious and not for the Ignorant February 25, 2000

By Michael J. Connor

Format:Hardcover

In one of the earlier reviews of this book the entry for "at" was misrepresented. I thought I would take some time to set the record straight. The entry for "at" is on page 141. It notes that usage writers from Vizetelly in 1906 onward have written disapprovingly about the use of the preposition "at" somewhere in the vicinity of and especially after the adverb where. The entry goes on to say that this is evidently chiefly an Americanism (attested by the OED Supplement and entered in the Dictionary of American Regional English), but not entirely unknown in British dialects. Scholarly works such as the Oxford English Dictionary, and the Dictionary of American Regional English are cited as well as citations from the Merriam Webster files. The evidence shows the idiom to be nearly nonexistent in discursive prose, although it occurs in letters and transcriptions of speech and there citations given from and Joel Chandler Harris, Flannery O'Connor. The entry gives an analysis of current usage saying that "at" at the end of pronominal phrase beginning with where serves to provide a word at the end of the sentence that can be given stress. It tends to follow a noun or pronoun to which the verb has been elided, as in this utterance by an editor here at the dictionary factory: "Have any idea where Kathy's at?" Then the entry has some conclusions and recommendation "You will note that at cannot simply be omitted; the 's must be expanded to is to produce an idiomatic sentence if the at is to be avoided." Frankly, there is nothing controversial about this, and information provided is accurate, reliable and verifiable. At the end of article is a note to see the entry labeled "Where ...At" for information about the mid 20th century use idiom. This article is on page 955 follows the pattern of the earlier one. There is the history of the usage issue, followed by a history of the idiom, and examples of actual usage, from Cyra McFadden, Paul Mazursky, quoted in Christian Science Monitor, Charles M. Young, Hunter S. Thompson, Dr. Gordon K. Davies, and Gunther S. Stent. Then come the conclusions and recommendations which are that "where it's at" and like phrases "continue to be used today, although they have some of the passe quality of old slang....Other than in these phrases, "at" almost never occurs after where in writing from standard sources." The Merriam Webster Dictionary of English Usage has more in common with the historical English grammars by Metzner, Sweet, Poutsma, Jespersen, Kruisinga and Curme, and the large standard reference grammars by the team of Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech and Svartvik then the run of the mill usage guide that is hawked to the uninformed. You should not let the casual tone of the writing fool you. The information given is accurate, verifiable and reliable.