A few words about quite a few words, with author Simon Winchester

NORFOLK — Author Simon Winchester spoke about his adventures in the book publishing business at a lecture at the Norfolk Library on Saturday, Nov. 18.

Winchester is the author of several books, but for his Nov. 18 lecture he focused on his 1998 book, “The Professor and the Madman: A Tale of Murder, Insanity, and the Making of the Oxford English Dictionary.”

The book is about the creation of the first Oxford English Dictionary in 1884 and, specifically, is the story of Dr. W. C. Minor, who submitted more than 10,000 definitions to the dictionary.

The committee overseeing the definitions, led by Professor James Murray, eventually discovered that Minor was an inmate at an asylum for the criminally insane.

“The book has sold millions of copies and remains in print almost 20 years after publication,” Library Director Ann Havemeyer said in introducing Winchester to an audience of 70 people. “I feel that it is fitting to welcome Simon here to speak because, in an interesting connection, the first volume of the dictionary comprising ‘A’ through ‘B’ was published in 1888, which was the year that the Norfolk Library was built.”

Winchester said that the inspiration for “The Professor and the Madman” came by chance when he was preparing to work on an altogether different project.

 “I was fascinated by the nature of tramp steamers,” Winchester told the audience. “There is nothing romantic about them, but they are like the gypsies of the sea. Some of them go from Baltimore to Miami, for example, carrying paper. Then when the boat is in Miami, it discharges its cargo and looks for another cargo to take somewhere else.”

Winchester planned to purchase a tramp steamer, recruit six of his friends to crew the boat and spend two years sailing around the world. The plan was that he would write a book about it —in fact, he was already under contract to a book publisher to do so.

Winchester’s plans changed after a lunch he had with his editor.

“Traditionally, after you have lunch with your editor, they show you a shelf of books that they are publishing during the next publishing season,” he said. “They tell you to ‘take any book that you like.’ I chose a book, almost at random, ‘Chasing the Sun: Dictionary Makers and the Dictionaries They Made’ by Jonathon Green.”

Winchester said that he was so enthralled with the book that “I was even reading it in the bath.”

“I came across this footnote in the book that said, ‘Readers of this book will, of course, be familiar with the story of Dr. Minor, the deranged American lunatic murderer who was a prolific contributor of the Oxford English Dictionary,’” Winchester said. 

“I sat up in the bath and said that sounds like an extraordinary story. I wondered if a book had ever been written about it.”

Winchester eventually compiled research for the book with help from a lexicographer friend and through Minor’s medical records.

A movie adaption of Winchester’s book has been partially  filmed but has been mired in a lawsuit over creative differences filed in July against Voltage Pictures by actor/producer Mel Gibson and screenwriter Farhad Safinia.