The Professor and the Madman

On a long trip driving from NY to Denver with my son, Benjamin, we listened to an absolutely great book.

THE PROFESSOR AND THE MADMAN: A TALE OF MURDER, INSANITY, AND THE MAKING OF THE OXFORD ENGLISH DICTIONARY
By Simon Winchester

This is a excellent book relating the development of Oxford English Dictionary (OED) and the relationship between two men, one mentally ill and the other a quintessential genius of language, both of who progressed the landmark development of the modern dictionary. This book relates the story of Dr. W. C. Minor and James Murray, an editor of the OED.

(the paraphased narrative below is from http://www.webster.edu/~corbetre/personal/reading/winchester-madman.html)

The OED plan of inviting the scholarly world and interested members of the public to submit slips of paper with relevant data to the editorial staff, documenting early and unusual uses of words which made the OED possible.

Dr. W.C. Minor who was incarcerated in a mental hospital for the incurably insane, having murdered a man in London due to his extreme paranoia. Minor was an American, retired Union US army officer, who served during the Civil War as a physician with Union forces in the Civil War. Minor’s experiences post traumatic mental illness during the war, being forced to brand Irish deserters from the Union army, as causative of his mental state and the murder. Minor, as inmate of a was allowed many privileges such as keeping another inmate as servant, having two cells to himself, allowed stores of fine wines and foods, and most importantly to this story, being allowed to accumulate a huge library of rare books.

When Murray put out his call for volunteer labor on the OED, Dr. Minor responded and over the next 30 years contributed more than 10,000 individual bits of valuable data, one of the most prolific and useful contributors of the unpaid volunteer workers despite his mental illness.

Minor began his contributions in 1880 and it wasn’t until 1889 that James Murray learned of Minor’s situation. He visited him in the asylum and they became close, if not friends, in those more formal times, at least close co-workers. Murray even played a role in trying to get Minor released from his detention, but Minor’s constant paranoid behavior undercut such appeals until he was very elderly, weak and sick.

I highly recommend this book for your reading pleasure.