Paratexts and the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary: ‘content marketing’ in the nineteenth century?
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Sarah Ogilvie
Abstract
This chapter explores the paratexts of the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), or New English Dictionary, in order to discover more about its creation, content, and context. In particular, the essay shows how the dedications and prefaces shed light on the dictionary’s history and context-especially who were its contributors, editors, competitors, sponsors, and supporters. The paratexts provide insights into the editors’ system of organization and editorial work; their views on language; comparisons with competitor dictionaries; and relationships with fellow editors, readers, subeditors, specialists, donors, and publisher. They also played a powerful role in establishing the ‘brand’ of the dictionary in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries as the most scholarly, most prestigious, and most comprehensive English dictionary in the world. To this end, we see that the editors used the paratextual materials to tell the world what they wanted the world to know, a precursor perhaps to the current phenomenon of online ‘content marketing’, a concept not defined yet in OED Online but understood in Silicon Valley as the strategic practice of creating a brand, building an audience, and selling a product by creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content.
Abstract
This chapter explores the paratexts of the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), or New English Dictionary, in order to discover more about its creation, content, and context. In particular, the essay shows how the dedications and prefaces shed light on the dictionary’s history and context-especially who were its contributors, editors, competitors, sponsors, and supporters. The paratexts provide insights into the editors’ system of organization and editorial work; their views on language; comparisons with competitor dictionaries; and relationships with fellow editors, readers, subeditors, specialists, donors, and publisher. They also played a powerful role in establishing the ‘brand’ of the dictionary in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries as the most scholarly, most prestigious, and most comprehensive English dictionary in the world. To this end, we see that the editors used the paratextual materials to tell the world what they wanted the world to know, a precursor perhaps to the current phenomenon of online ‘content marketing’, a concept not defined yet in OED Online but understood in Silicon Valley as the strategic practice of creating a brand, building an audience, and selling a product by creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content.
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter I
- Contents V
- Introduction VII
- Reading Trench reading Richardson 1
- Did Anne Maxwell print John Wilkins’s An essay towards a real character and a philosophical language (1668)? 23
- “As well for the entertainment of the curious, as the information of the ignorant” 57
- Printed English dictionaries in the National Library of Russia to the mid-seventeenth century 95
- “A hundred visions and revisions”: Malone’s annotations to Johnson’s Dictionary 115
- The use of “mechanical reasoning”: John Quincy and his Lexicon physico-medicum (1719) 149
- Paratexts and the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary: ‘content marketing’ in the nineteenth century? 165
- The “wants” of women: Lexicography and pedagogy in seventeenth- and eighteenthcentury dictionaries* 187
- Claudius Hollyband: A lexicographer speaks his mind 211
- Subscribers and Patrons: Jacob Serenius and his Dictionarium Anglo-Svethico-Latinum 1734 237
- “Weak Shrube or Underwood”: The unlikely medical glossator John Woodall and his glossary 261
- A “florid” preface about “a language that is very short, concise and sententious” 285
- List of contributors 307
- Index 311
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter I
- Contents V
- Introduction VII
- Reading Trench reading Richardson 1
- Did Anne Maxwell print John Wilkins’s An essay towards a real character and a philosophical language (1668)? 23
- “As well for the entertainment of the curious, as the information of the ignorant” 57
- Printed English dictionaries in the National Library of Russia to the mid-seventeenth century 95
- “A hundred visions and revisions”: Malone’s annotations to Johnson’s Dictionary 115
- The use of “mechanical reasoning”: John Quincy and his Lexicon physico-medicum (1719) 149
- Paratexts and the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary: ‘content marketing’ in the nineteenth century? 165
- The “wants” of women: Lexicography and pedagogy in seventeenth- and eighteenthcentury dictionaries* 187
- Claudius Hollyband: A lexicographer speaks his mind 211
- Subscribers and Patrons: Jacob Serenius and his Dictionarium Anglo-Svethico-Latinum 1734 237
- “Weak Shrube or Underwood”: The unlikely medical glossator John Woodall and his glossary 261
- A “florid” preface about “a language that is very short, concise and sententious” 285
- List of contributors 307
- Index 311
