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Summary: A fun book...... about a dictionary!
Review: I saw this book and read the cover. I couldn't help but laugh. "A Tale of Murder, Insanity, and the Making of the Oxford English Dictionary"? Well, that phrase is what got me to buy the book. This is as good a book you'll find written about a dictionary.There are only two main characters in the novel. The first is Dr. James Murray- the editor for the Dictionary for 40 years and a gentlemanly Scotsman who loves his family and is dedicated to his work. The second is Dr. W.C. Minor, an American Civil War veteran driven mad by images of battles, committed a murder, and was therefore relocated to the Broadmoor Asylum in England. Their lives cross when Murray sent out a call of help to find words of all sorts, strange words used in interesting ways, and normal words that may also catch one's attention. Minor received the letter in his mail, and with very little else to do, he took the challenge and searched through his own library located in his cell. He found original sources for words, tenses in which these words were used that no one had ever heard of, and thousands of quotations in which the words were used. Through intense research, the book played out as a story instead of a historical reference. There are many true and interresting facts about the dictionary included, but (and for a better story, I think) the author put his efforts toward the abnormal relationship between the two men. It is a wonderful novel written about the creation of the OED and Dr. W.C. Minor, it goes from his birth, to his death, from his battles in the Civil War, to that fateful day he shot a man dead in Lambeth, London. And yet poor Dr. Murray is put on the back burner, a much colder spot as compared to the spotlight focused on Minor. Although Dr. Minor did most likely lead the more interesting life inside the asylum, I think Murray would have liked a bit more than what was written about him. But the book is great at what it does, which is tell the story of the connection between the two doctors and how they worked for so long to create the world's greatest English dictionary. Although a book about a dictionary sounds like the bad choice for a novel, I can guarantee you it is not. Make this one your next buy.
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Summary: 2 men and a book
Review: The Professor and the Madman is a moderately engaging story of two men and the making of the Oxford English Dictionary. The history of the dictionary itself is the most interesting aspect of this book. The intertwined story of the madman contributor is distracting and tedious.
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Summary: A Keenly Interesting Story of Mad Obsession and Redemption
Review: Two men labored on a monumental task, in cramped, confinedquarters in the latter part of the 19th century... Dr. Murray was theeditor of the bourgeoning project which would become known as the Oxford English Dictionary, the other, Dr. Minor, a key contributor to said project. Eerily similar situations and lifestyles, except the contributor had been incarcerated in an insane asylum for an earlier murder. This was a very engaging and interesting book, and at times read like a well researched detective novel rather than a non-fiction offering. The (book) chronicles the death of the sympathetic victim of Dr. Minor, Minor's child hood is juxtaposed w/ that of Dr. Murray, the birth idea of the dictionary, and then the subsequent correspondences between the two as the dictionary is built. It was interesting to watch as the author portrayed the ever repentant Dr. Minor [later apologizing and financing the widow of the man killed in a manic moment] finding a meaning and possible redemption through his voluminous contributions to the dictionary. Further of interest were the philosophical questions raised about if Dr. Minor had received modern treatments whether he would have been inclined to participate as heavily as he did over the ensuing decades. Overall I learned a great deal about lexicography and dictionary births through this story, it moved swiftly and elegantly in a scholarly voice, and was an enjoyable read. Recommended. END
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Summary: The Professor and the Madman
Review: A fascinating story of two individuals searching for their holy grail. The first, a man on a mission to complete the ultimate dictionary. The second, a man searching for a reason for his existence. These two lives are connected by a murder, a love of words, and the respective prisons of each. For the former, his Scriptorium. For the latter, his suite in the Broadmoor Lunatic Asylum. My only criticism is the author's editorial insertion of his opinion on women in the military.
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Summary: Fantastic read for armchair etymologists
Review: This book is an absolute must for anyone with an interest in language. Winchester's telling of the saga behind the creation of the Oxford English Dictionary is at once dramatically engaging and philologically illuminating. The story will open for you exciting vistas in the scholarly world before and after the OED...fascinating stuff. Winchester's style is eminently readable, and his affection for words is abundantly clear. Any wanna-be linguists would do well to read it. Its only shortcomings are (in my opinion) an overly-extended examination of the history of schizophrenia at the end of the story and an epilogue which dragged somewhat. All in all, however, a TERRIFIC read which would be worth anyone's time.
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Summary: How the heck did they write that HUGE dictionary?
Review: Simon Winchester answers this question with a story of violence, passion, tragedy, and sympathy. What more could you want in a story about a dictionary? I love books that shine with the author's enthusiasm for the subject. _The Professor and the Madman_ is just that type of book. Winchester obviously loves language and word origin. He gives the reader a look at etymology that is detailed enough to make you feel like a scholar, but selective enough so that you aren't overwhelmed with the rather dry science of language. But this is only the secondary plot. The main story, that of the obsession of the scholarly but homicidally deranged Dr. W.C. Minor, the focused and driven brilliance of Dr. James Murray, and the Oxford English Dictionary that brought them together is thrilling and tragic. Winchester does a great job of sharing with the reader the sadness and regret of Dr. Minor's amazing intellect trapped inside his deranged mind. If you've ever had a relative or friend succumb to Alzheimer's or another mental disease, you can understand the tragedy of such an intruguing person losing a battle with sanity. The story is so unique that it could only be true, and Winchester seems to have researched it thoroughly and accurately. I highly recommend it.
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Summary: Good Read
Review: A very interesting and entertaining story incorporating a feel for the Victorian Era, historical treatment of mental illness and the personal story of the relationship of two men who were instrumental in creating the OED.
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Summary: Something to Offend or Delight Everyone :)
Review: Wow. 151 reviews before mine, and who knows how many more willfollow. Simon Winchester seems to have a touched a nerve in many ofus. Some, like me, find the book fascinating, well written, and encyclopaedic in its well researched detail on a subject that would seem arcane but is actually compelling. Sure, this book isn't for you if you prefer Mills & Boone, but if M&B is your preference, I don't think it fair to review and criticise this book for failing to meet those standards. Alternatively, if you have an amateur interest in social history, and if you have ever wondered (or never thought to wonder) at how the "first" (sort of) ever definitive dictionary of English came to be written, then this book is sure to entertain. At the risk of sounding like a publicist, buy the book to see what it is that so many other people are arguing so heatedly over! :) As a slightly more serious summary, the book is a good read for ordinary people (like me) who are likely to appreciate an overview introduction to an arcane side-bar aspect to the making of the OED. And at the wonderful value paperback price available here on Amazon, well worth buying. END
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting but somewhat of a hard read
Review: I found the backgrounds of the two men featured in this book to be interesting. I also found the process used to write the OED fascinating. But, all in all, I found this book easy to put down and hard to get through. It did not captivate me.
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Summary: Madness yes, but Victorian madness, by fermed
Review: Some of the readers who have posted their comments (150 so far) have bitterly complained about this book: it is boring, slightly fraudulent, and not informative enough, they say. I sympathize with those points of view and will not argue against them; yet I read the book twice, once soon after it was published, and a few months later after I read James Tully's book "Prisoner 1167: the madman who was Jack the Ripper." Both books involve insane murders, and both have their main characters committed to Broadmoor, a notorious asylum near Oxford. For those interested in Victorian thrillers, and certainly for Jack the Ripper aficionados, I highly recommend both books, read together or in close sequence. Aside from the murders that each committed in a fit of paranoia, each made a fair adjustment to incarceration, although eventually they deteriorated:... James Kelly, who escaped Broadmoore after five years, came back much later an impoverished and demented man who wanted to turn himself in to die. Both personages were crazy; and the books that describe them are flawed in similar ways: they are improperly edited, so that each is both too long (in irrelevancies) and too short (in excitement) at the same time. Still, for those with an acquired taste for all things Victorian, this duo will delight and inform. Others best skip both of them.
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