Neology resources needed

[Paul McFedries]

"Once or twice recently I have looked up a word in the dictionary for fear
of being again accused of coining, and have found it there right enough --
only to read on and find that the sole authority is myself in a
half-forgotten novel."
--Thomas Hardy

Paul

----- Original Message -----
From: "Fred Shapiro" <fred.shapiro at YALE.EDU>
To: <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
Sent: Thursday, October 11, 2001 1:43 PM
Subject: Re: Neology resources needed


> A fascinating older book is Leon Mead, _Word-Coinage_ (1902).  He did
> things like ask famous authors about whether they had ever knowingly
> coined any words.  Most denied it, and said they would never dream of
> doing such a thing.  I particularly find interesting Mark Twain's saying
> that he had never coined a word as far as he knew; the historical
> dictionaries list him as the first user of many hundreds of terms.