Eerdmans Books for Young Readers The Right Word: Roget and His Thesaurus

Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases, Classified and Arranged so as to Fascilitate the Expression of Ideas and Assist in Literary Composition（1852）の著者で、シソーラスの祖とされるロジェの伝記は評者の知る限りは下記の3部が発行されているが、 Emblen, D. L. 1970. Peter Mark Roget；The Word and the Man, Rennison, N. 2007. Peter Mark Roget: The Man Who Became a Book, Kendall, J. 2008. The Man who Made Lists: Love, Death, Madness, and the Creation of Roget’s Thesaurus, いずれも、専門者向けで入手も難しい。本書は子供向きの絵本で､ 挿絵や写真を楽しみながらロジェの生涯とシソーラス誕生の経緯を知ることができる。なかでも最終頁の手稿本（1805）（existenceの項）の写真は見る人を圧倒するだろう。また年表の中でPiozziの British Synonymy Or an Attempt at Regulating the Choice of Words in Familiar Conversation(1794)をロジェのシソーラスの先駆としてあげているのも興味深い。ロジェのシソーラスは実用的に使うには手に余る。折に触れて参照して英語と英語の文化・論理を身につけてゆくのが最も良いと思われる。その前にロジェの伝記をまず読むとよい。

Jen Bryant and Melissa Sweet did a wonderful job portraying Roget and his penchant for words and lists. This picture book is an apt/suitable/fitting telling of a remarkable life.

Interesting for children

I need Roget's Thesaurus to think of enough adjectives for this amazing book. Jen Bryant can certainly write a great children's biography, engaging, poetic, and fun! My daughter and I enjoyed Six Dots: A Story of Young Louis Braille but this book is even better. We love words at our house so this book is even more meaningful. As an adult I am especially pleased when I also learn new facts from a children's book and it turns out I really did not know much about Dr. Roget at all. Jen's writing style is fabulous and her words flow off the tongue when reading this aloud. My favorite sentence just from the standpoint of an amazing impact on the reader- "Baby Annette slept in Mother's arms, a small pink blossom against a wall of black." I can visualize the scene perfectly from that one sentence. You can feel it even. You just know that Peter's mother must be in mourning because his father died. On the next page you find that is exactly the case. The entire book is amazing like that. I read one beautiful passage and then my daughter wanted to read it as well. It really is fun to say the beautiful words out loud! In addition to Bryant's inspired prose, Sweet's art is also fabulous. I am not sure how to describe it, maybe scrapbook style? There really are a lot of interesting things going on in the pictures that's for sure. So, we loved both reading and looking at this wonderful book. We highly recommend it!

caldecott winner!