Word by Word: The Secret Life of Dictionaries

Word by Word: The Secret Life of Dictionaries is by lexicographer Kory Stamper. (If you saw the awesome Netflix series “History of Swear Words” then you saw her speak.) Stamper worked for almost 20 years at Merriam Webster, and in this book she explains how they define words, how they choose which words to include in the first place, how it can take literally NINE MONTHS just to fully distill the essence of one word down into what we get in the dictionary.

A book about dictionaries sounds really boring, doesn't it? I promise you it isn't! Anyone reading this review probably loves books, and probably loves words. But trust me, I had NO IDEA how much went into just defining words. In hindsight it makes sense but holy cow... and Stamper doesn't just provide these explanations, she does it with humor that will make you laugh and groan as she tells you about the time a cleaning crew accidentally undid weeks of work in one night.

She also delves into the misconception that the people at Merriam Webster are the ones who decide what is a word, as though they are the arbiters of language rather than the scribes. You wouldn't think the dictionary would provide drama, but then you read about the hate mail they received when the word marriage was updated to include same-sex marriages.

This book is really funny, informative, and one of my favorite non-fiction books. Five stars from me, and I strongly recommend it for anyone who loves words!