Is the Dictionary Done For?

Is the Dictionary Done For? The print edition of Merriam-Webster was once a touchstone of authority and stability. Then the internet brought about a revolution. Wars over words are inevitably culture wars, and debates over the dictionary have raged for as long as it has existed. Once, every middle-class home had a piano and a dictionary. The purpose of the piano was to be able to listen to music before phonographs were available and affordable. Later on, it was to torture young persons by insisting that they learn to do something few people do well. The purpose of the dictionary was to settle intra-family disputes over the spelling of words like "camaraderie" and "sesquipedalian," or over the correct pronunciation of "puttee." This was the state of the world not that long ago. In the late nineteen-eighties, Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary was on the best-seller list for a hundred and fifty-five consecutive weeks. Fifty-seven million copies were sold, a number believed to be second only, in this country, to sales of the Bible. There was good money in the word business.