Getting Yourself a Thesaurus

I’m just after learning something from reading the preface to my own thesaurus; “The word thesaurus comes from the Greek word thesauros meaning ‘storehouse’ or ‘treasure’.” Which in my experience, I have found to be very true. In fact, I would say it is a storehouse of treasure that I get value and joy out of every day.

I own the ‘Oxford Thesaurus of English’ and it was given to me a number of years ago as a Christmas present from my parents. It is a huge hard-backed tome. When I tore off the wrapping paper I let out a shriek of delight and hugged this giant book, much to the bemusement of the rest of my family.

I know they all thought I was a little weird to be so ecstatic over getting a book of words. But I had been writing as part of my art work for some time and I felt that I was sometimes lacking the vocabulary I needed to fully express myself. I’ve been a reader for a long time so my vocabulary isn’t bad but I was finding that I was a little repetitive in my word usage. I have also found that in terms of spelling I don’t have great memory retention so it helps to have an accurate spelling tool in the house.

I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE my thesaurus. I find it genuinely helpful and so I do whole-heartedly recommend getting one. In my edition there is a brilliant Wordfinder section. It gives list of words, like Fascinating Words- e.g. ‘apple-knocker, US informal, an ignorant or unsophisticated person’, or ‘sternutator, something that causes sneezing.’ There are Archaic Words, words that are no longer in everyday use- e.g. ‘fandangle, a useless or purely ornamental thing’ or ‘rapscallion, a mischievous person.’ There are lists of all kind of animals and birds from an Adjutant-Bird to a Yellowhammer. There is a list of art movements from Abstract to Vorticism. There are lists of cakes from Almond cake to Zuppa Inglese. There are lists of insects from an Agrion to a Yellow-Jacket. There are lists of words for most categories you can think of, it is an amazing resource.

I know you are probably all shouting, ‘Nerd Alert! Nerd Alert!’ by this time but I honestly don’t care. Word power gives me great joy and I do think it is a great gift for anyone.

All that’s left for me to say is I wish you a happy, a content, a cheerful, a merry, a joyful, a jovial, a gleeful, a glowing and a rapturous Easter and I hope that you eat, consume, devour, gobble, nosh, put away, tuck into and scoff many, many chocolate eggs!