This is not my jam. And this is despite my love of words, wordplay, etymology, and quotations. The cleverness too often gets in the way of clarity, the etymologies are torturously tortuous, the quotes too often do not illuminate the word, and some of the definitions are shockingly incomplete, at best. There’s a space on my shelves for a work like this, but this particular oeuvre fails to fill it.

Such a fascinating book.