The Word Museum: The Most Remarkable English Words Ever Forgotten

This book is a must have for any author of historical fiction. It just lets you know that bit of history surrounding a word and why it was used. Finding out what a giggle-trot is or a kimbly or a natkin. It would be an excellent way to add some true color to a manuscript! I'm just going to have to put his other books on my wish list.

This is a very amusing book. The reader learns a bit of history through each discription for the word he/she may look up (it's set in Dictionary style). It's interesting to see what words were forgotten and also to learn why some of them, well...just don't seem to fit our dialect anymore. ;P Nevertheless, this is a helpful book to have on hand whenever you're playing Scrabble!

Jeffrey Kacirk, The Word Museum: The Most Remarkable English Words Ever Forgotten (Simon and Schuster, 2000) A small, yet wonderful, dictionary of words that, for the most part, are no longer in use and probably should be. Other reviewers have pointed out that Kacirk could have done more with this, and they're correct, but I had no problems at all with what's here. The only real expectations I had coming into this were that I'd get the words and find out what they meant, and that's exactly what I got. It's better than your thesaurus. You need it. ****

If you are someone who loves Dictionaries, crossword puzzles, history and humor, this is the book to buy. I own a copy and have bought copies for for my daughter and my mother to enjoy. Lending them my OWN copy is not an option. This is a book to skip around in, refer to, and look over (yes, I know all those dangling participles) because one never knows when the ancient job of "knocker up" may be a necessary piece of information to have at your fingertips.

Jeffrey Kacirk dedicates "The Word Museum: The Most Remarkable English Ever Forgotten" to Lewis Carroll because of the delectable verbiage introduced in "Jabberwocky." This seems right, as Kacirk's choice of words here are as fun, unique and rarely use Carroll's. This is not an etymological study, but an comfortable overview of antiquated words. He start off with 'abbey-lubber,' which is a pretentious loiterer in a religious house. I am unsure how I'll tastefully work this into a sentence next Sunday at church, but I am glad to have such a word in my quiver should the occasion arise. Don't dismay if, while reading this, you feel you are seeing words new to you. Most of these words haven't escaped rare book rooms in 200 years. For example, we prefer, 'librarian' over 'bibliothecary' and children tend to choose 'sleepy' instead of 'Billy-wink.' As Kacirk defines words, he slips in a number of woodcut illustrations, adding to the appeal. They are always somehow correlated with a word on that page. Grab a glass of something cold, and thoughtfully stroke your 'ziff' (beard) while reading this in a 'zypthesary' (brewhouse). It may be 'faffle' (work occupied requiring much labor with non-commensurate results), but maybe not. I enjoyed "The Word Museum: The Most Remarkable English Ever Forgotten" by Jeffrey Kacirk. Anthony Trendl editor, HungarianBookstore.com