The New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on historical principles (1993)

Day 4
I have accepted the challenge to post the cover of seven books that I love: no explanation, no review, just the cover. Today, The New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on historical principles, edited by Lesley Brown, in two volumes, Clarendon Press, 1993. Each time I post a cover, I’ll ask a friend to take up the challenge. Meanwhile, here are 100 words on a word in the title:

English (July)

It’s riverish, it ravishes. Lavish and established, it’s never squeamish. Prone to the embellish and churlish, the gibberish and purplish, whether brutish and shortish or bookish, too-longish, yet it keeps its parish, still will relish the waggish, cherish the blemish, and astonish the foolish. Publish or perish, still it will flourish. The rudish fish where the prudish pish. The wish is to burnish, to spit and polish, accomplish the stylish, the swish, outlandish, to garnish undiminished. Cleverish, it will distinguish the weather’s more than July, it’s Julyish. It furnishes tongues with a curvish dervish. Delish! One day it will vanish.

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READINGS OF THE WORK BY PHILIP HARVEY

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