Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase & Fable (18th edition)

摘要

I always liked the notion of Ebenezer Brewer having his room painted white so that he could scribble memoranda, appointments and other matters of interest to him on his walls. I am only disappointed that this was late in his life and did not represent the manner of compiling his famous dictionary. The author of a series of educational factual books published by Cassell, he collected in the process of compiling them a large amount and wide range of miscellaneous information which by 1870 he had expanded into the Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, Giving the Derivation, Source or Origin of Common Phrases, Allusions, and Words that have a Tale to Tell. It proved an immediate and major success: 100,000 copies were claimed to have been printed by the launch of the second edition in 1895.