Welcome to Writers Talkback. If you are a new user, your account will have to be approved manually to prevent spam. Please bear with us in the meantime
A recent review on Amazon complains that the Oxford Dictionary of English is, 'too big...and a sufferance to carry'.
Comments
The trouble with taking abridged copies, like student editions with you when you are away (I do this - and a small thesaurus and a small rhyming dictionary) is that you are never satisfied with the choice they have available. And tbh, any word you actually have to look up is bound not to be in it...
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/feb/20/wikipedia-1000-volume-print-edition-crowdfunding
Opening OED at random, I find: malapert, which would fit many a TBer, meaning boldly disrespectful or impudent, and can be used as a noun, meaning an impudent person. You bunch of malaperts, you.
Or penetralia: the innermost parts of a building; a secret or hidden place.
Or ropeable: (Aus/NZ informal) angry, furious.
Dictionaries are fun!
I prefer a book dictionary to an internet one - as internet ones are not always correct, and can be misleading in their lack of information and examples.
Plus Chambers gives the root of the words which is helpful in remembering how to spell them - a skill that is ignored by schools but which has helped me to know how to spell stuff through my life.