Concise Dictionary of Twenty-Six Languages in Simultaneous Translation

I continue to think how fortunate I am that I found this book when it was first released. I searched many auctions to find a copy for a friend who also writes. If I could give the exciting word adventure that I found in this book, I would give it to everyone I know; not everyone would appreciate it, but the thought counts.There are only 1000 words, but those words can be the canvas for your word pictures. I find myself thinking about the stories that Scheherazade told every night for 1000 nights; the stories that saved her life. Perhaps that is where the use of 1000 was derived. The book has sufficient white space and is in a font that does not disappear unless you have a magnifying glass to make it easy to read. The main index is in English, and under each word is the corresponding entry in each of the twenty-six languages; these lists are the only definitions. The languages are: English, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Rumanian, German, Dutch, Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, Polish, Czech, Serbo-Croatian, Hungarian, Finnish, Turkish, Indonesian, Swahili, and Esperanto plus the six which are transliterated from Russian, Greek, Arabic, Hebrew, Yiddish and Japanese into Roman spelling; these include the original script as well. Many programs and on-line searches will give you other languages for whatever word or phrase you want. However, how many will strike a creative urge? Words such as svila (Serbo-Croation), seiyem (Hungarian), kinu (Japanese), silk (English) can take your imagination into new worlds. To me, nothing is quite as good as a hardback with a worn cover, the smell of dust, and yellowed pages accumulated from years of usage. This is one of my treasures, and it is always on my desk. For me, it is, and always has been, five stars.Victoria Tarrani