While finishing up a PhD at Cambridge and preparing to move back to my country of origin, one of the small but solid griefs of that process was saying goodbye to the familiar Oxford English Dictionary, whose massive volumes lay 13 steps to the right of my desk in Cambridge’s Tyndale House Library. In the three and a half years before that parting, I must have worn a rut in the carpeting during my frequent and satisfying sallies to the OED for help, rescue, and—occasionally—delightful surprise.
Most of us can’t have the OED that close to our respective elbows. No matter, we can still do very well. The answer lies in the New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary.
There’s no better recourse for English-language wordsmiths, and I don’t mean only those who speak the Queen’s English, or aspire to do so.
From its phonetic pronunciation guides to its fabulous etymological material and on to the definition of the chosen word in diverse dialects and contexts, the shorter OED is simply unparalleled. This is one of those rare moments when a reviewer can actually ask rhetorically, ‘Why would you want to look anywhere else?’
Why?
Canter Bridge 
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