Dicționarul Cuvintelor Pierdute

In the late nineteenth century, young Esme Nicoll grows up in the Scriptorium, an Oxford garden shed where her father and other lexicographers assemble the first Oxford English Dictionary. While the men focus on formal, literary vocabulary, Esme begins rescuing slips of paper that fall under the table—words they deem common, vulgar, or irrelevant. She collects these discarded terms into her own private archive, documenting the vernacular of the working class and the specific shared experiences of women. As the suffrage movement gains momentum and the Great War begins, Esme organizes these "lost" words into a record that accounts for the segments of society the official volumes ignore.

Historical fiction readers with an interest in linguistics and feminist historiography will find here a detailed examination of the politics of language. It appeals to those who enjoy narratives about archive-building and the technical process of dictionary compilation. Readers walk away with a specific understanding of how academic gatekeeping shaped the English language by omitting the daily lives of women and the poor. The book offers a concrete look at the labor involved in early reference works and how the choices of a few editors defined the limits of public expression for decades.