Johnson's dictionary

[James C Stalker]

The Financial Times (April 2/3, 2005) has an interesting piece by Henry
Hitchings who has just published "Defining the World: The Extraordinary
Story of Dr. Johnson's Dictionary,"  Farrar, Straus, and Giroux.  It is,
after all, the 250th anniversary of the publication of said dictionary.
Hitchings claims that US lawyers consult Johnson, not Webster, in order to
interpret the US Constituition.  Interesting claim.  If Roger is still out
there lurking, he might have a comment on that point of view.

Sorry.  I don't have a URL for the FT piece. It might be available on their
web site.

JCS

Paul Frank writes:

> Guardian article about Samuel Johnson's Dictionary of the English Language:
>
> http://books.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,12084,1449514,00.html
>
> Paul
> ________________________
> Paul Frank
> Chinese-English translator
> paulfrank at post.harvard.edu
> http://languagejottings.blogspot.com
>



James C. Stalker
Department of English
Michigan State University