GoKawiilSeven books I keep close because I love them
The bookshelf by my elbow, the one that I can reach without getting up, has seven books on it, not necessarily the ones I look in the most, but the ones whose emanations I most hope will infuse me as I write. Roget's Thesaurus (4th edition) The one I actually refer to most often is the Harper and Row Roget's Thesaurus. I thought I had acquired this in my teens, but the note on the flyleaf says 1989. This is the fourth edition. I was very excited to get the eighth edition, which I thought I might like better, and for some time I kept them next to each other so that I could look up the same things in both, and compare. my conclusion was that while the eighth edition had more stuff in it, it wasn't stuff I needed. And it is really fat. So I have retired it to a farther shelf and will eventually get rid of it. The thesaurus is a book that is widely misunderstood. It is not, as many people mockingly imagine, just a compendium of synonyms, and its correct and intended use is not to replace common words with more impressive-sounding ones. just as the correct use of a screwdriver is not to scrape the veneer off of an expensive cabinet. “Thesaurus” means “storehouse" or “treasure room”. Roget's idea, similar to that of John Wilkins before him, was to classify everything in the world into a hierarchy, in this case a hierarchy with a thousand divisions. At the top level the divisions are grouped into "Abstract concepts", "Space”, “Physics”, “Matter”, “Sensation” and so on. Then under “abstract concepts” there are subclasses, of which subclass VI is “Time”, subdivided into five smaller sections: A. Absolute time
B. Relative time
C. Time with reference to age
D. Time with reference to season
E. Recurrent time At the next level down, section (1)(VI)(B) is divided into: §116. Priority
§117. Posteriority
§118. Simultaneity
§119. The Past
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