The Story of Ain't

by David Skinner

  Academic commentators felt a compensatory urge to stand up for Webster’s Third and deny any legitimacy to the controversy it had birthed. This led to new absurdities. In College English, James Sledd found numerous faults in Webster’s Third but then, at the risk of giving his readers whiplash, praised it exuberantly. The dictionary’s typography he found hard to read, and he thought its use of slang labels for semi-obscenities such as pissed off and pisspoor was inadequate. He criticized Gove’s defining style, his system of usage labels, and the dropping of colloquial. Finally, he questioned the dictionary’s practice of using quotations to convey usage information, especially when the lexicographer himself felt unprepared to pass judgment. The language was perhaps in an unusual state of flux, Sledd conceded, but this did not mean that distinctions between formal and informal no longer existed. And then, with little warning, he made an about-face, insisting the merits of Webster’s Third were “infinitely greater than those of the reviews,” such as his own, “which have lightly questioned them.”3 Sledd was too honest to leave out what he did not like about Webster’s Third but, it seemed, also too angry at its critics to conclude with anything short of generous praise.

  In 1964, James Parton announced plans for the American Heritage Dictionary, which linguists took to calling the Goldwater Dictionary, a play on the adrenaline-charged campaign of Barry Goldwater, the Arizona senator who became the Republican nominee for president that year.4 The original small-government conservative, Goldwater (channeling Cicero) famously declared that “extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice. And moderation in pursuit of justice is no virtue.”

  Parton’s dictionary became known for two innovations. One, it was the first dictionary to include an entry for fuck, and, two, it established a usage panel of distinguished writers and scholars whose opinions on disputed usages were discussed in stand-alone articles. Its members included several critics of Webster’s Third: Mario Pei, Wilson Follett, Dwight Macdonald, and Jacques Barzun.

  Patrick E. Kilburn, a language scholar who defended Webster’s Third against Dwight Macdonald in the anthology James Sledd co-edited, claimed to have discovered the ages of ninety-five members of the usage panel, only six of whom were under fifty, and twenty-eight of whom had been born in the nineteenth century. The advertising campaign for Parton’s dictionary touted its generational bearings, with print ads showing a long-haired youth while the tagline addressed someone who was not at all a hippie: “He doesn’t like your politics. Why should he like your dictionary?” All the same, the American Heritage Dictionary developed into a worthy rival of Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary.

  After a couple of years, the controversy over Webster’s Third lost its purchase on the public mind, but it remained a touchstone for disputes over usage and linguistics. Smaller controversies broke out along the way, including a quantitative dispute over exactly how much Gove had reduced the use of the slang label and whether, in fact, Merriam had sufficient evidence for its more tolerant handling of ain’t. Rather improbably, given the continued drift toward ever more informal usage in American English, Gove remained on the defensive about ain’t for years.5

  The defense of Webster’s Third, that its underlying principles were basically indistinguishable from those of Webster’s Second—an argument developed in reaction to the controversy within a controversy surrounding the five precepts of modern linguistics cited by Gove—never squared with how utterly different the two dictionaries seemed and how they appealed to very different sensibilities and reflected very different moments in lexicographical history. In their positions on obscenities, their usage labels, their approaches to pronunciation, their views on quotable authors, their use of citations, and also their defining styles, the two dictionaries are as different as, well, 1934 and 1961.

  One lesson inadequately learned from the controversy was the need to respect, no, not opposing viewpoints (don’t worry, I’m not going soft), but basic rules of evidence. Pride as well as something about language—its familiarity, its apparent simplicity and hidden mysteries—makes us want to claim expertise far beyond what we individually know. Those with intellectual gifts of a literary nature seem especially prone.

  In April 2001, David Foster Wallace published in Harper’s magazine a long and scathing essay on usage and linguistics, a portion of which was devoted to reaming Philip Gove and Webster’s Third. Wallace, the most celebrated novelist of his generation and a much-ballyhooed essayist, had made use of dictionaries in his fiction as a convenient symbol of great mental power. “I’m an OED man, Doctor,” says a character in Infinite Jest. “And Webster’s Seventh isn’t even up-to-date. Webster’s Eighth amends to. . . .”

  In his Harper’s essay, Wallace made it known that he was definitely no Webster’s Third man. But even as he bragged about being the type of incorrigible nerd who actually reads the introductions to dictionaries and takes language disputes very, very seriously, the great literary mind of his generation failed to open Webster’s Third before trying to quote from it.

  Citing “Gove’s now-classic introduction to Webster’s Third,” Wallace listed the five precepts from Gove’s Word Study article, which came, of course, from English Language Arts. So, not only was Wallace not quoting any portion of Webster’s Third, he was quoting Gove quoting an NCTE study. Wallace also stated that Webster’s Third had included heighth and irregardless “without any monitory labels on them”—which was simply not true, as heighth was called a “chiefly dialectal variant of height” and irregardless was labeled nonstandard, Gove’s most prohibitive label. Wallace may as well have been a member of the American Scholar editorial board for all the due diligence he performed before pouncing on Webster’s Third. And he failed to consult the recent literature on the subject, in particular Herbert C. Morton’s defense of Philip Gove, The Story of Webster’s Third, published seven years earlier, in which all of these items were discussed.

  Despite its continued usefulness and good reputation among scholars, Webster’s Third remains known as not merely a flawed dictionary, but one that some intellectuals feel free to attack with impunity. And at least two essays that misrepresent its contents—Macdonald’s and Wallace’s—remain celebrated and in print. The volume reprinting Wallace’s essay, Consider the Lobster, was a New York Times notable book of the year in 2005 (which, from this angle, seems weirdly appropriate), while Macdonald’s essay, reprinted after some slight editing for his own volume Against the American Grain, was republished in the 1980s and again in 2011. Macdonald slightly edited his essay but left it mostly unchanged, while none of Wallace’s errors were ever corrected. In fact, the mistake about “Gove’s now-classic introduction” went unnoticed except by the blogger Stephen Dodson, who writes under the name Language Hat, and, some years later, by myself, as I was doing research for an article on Morton’s book.

  But to get a copy of James Sledd’s impressive sixty-five-page response to the controversy, his review of the reviews, in which he pulls no punches, it helps to have access to a major research library. This treatise was published in Symposium on Language and Culture, the Proceedings of the 1962 Annual Spring Meeting of the American Ethnological Society, not exactly Reader’s Digest. And Raven McDavid’s masterful examination of the controversy can be found in Philip Gove’s papers at the University of Wyoming’s American Heritage Center, in Laramie.

  Merriam continued to sell a lot of dictionaries. Revenues were $6 million in 1963 and, in September 1964, the company sold for $14 million to Encyclopaedia Britannica Inc., the encyclopedia and Great Books publisher then owned by former senator William Benton.

  Not long afterward, Dwight Macdonald cut out of Time magazine an article announcing the news. Then he wrote in the margin: “William Benton, chairman and chief owner of two scandalously bad reference works, the EB and the 50-volume set of Great Books . . . in the fall of 1964 completed the trilogy by paying $14 million for the third: W’s Third.” Obviously, this was b
ad news to Macdonald: “He, Benton, is to American culture as Attila was to Rome—or Robert Moses is to New York City. Or Dean Rusk is to Vietnam.”6

  Also in 1963, Macdonald cut out from Newsweek a column about Lyndon B. Johnson’s telephone and table manners. It contained a choice bit of evidence concerning the increasing informality of American English. At lunch with some congressmen, LBJ told an old story about House Speaker Sam Rayburn and another newly installed president, Harry Truman. Rayburn goes to see Truman and tells him that in the White House he’s going to lose touch with reality. He will be surrounded by yes-men, and all of them will act like the president of the United States is just about the smartest man in the whole wide world. Then LBJ said, “And you all know he ain’t.”

  Dramatis Personae

  Asa Baker, president of G. & C. Merriam Company and member of the Editorial Board that set genteel policies for Webster’s Second, published in 1934. Very much knew how to present a Webster’s dictionary to the public.

  Jacques Barzun, Columbia professor of history and distinguished spokesman for the humanities. He abhorred jargon, criticized the influence of linguistics in American schools, and became a major critic of Webster’s Third.

  J. P. Bethel, forward-looking general editor at Merriam-Webster who argued that Webster’s Third could not follow the basic formula for Webster’s Second without becoming a two-volume dictionary, which everyone believed would be commercially disastrous.

  Leonard Bloomfield, socially challenged language scholar who wrote a unifying treatise of linguistics in 1933. He is the classic example of what is called a structural linguist.

  Henry Seidel Canby, editor of the Saturday Review of Literature and selector for the Book-of-the-Month Club, he was an establishment figure of middlebrow culture and loathed by Dwight Macdonald, but a worthwhile observer of the changing literary scene.

  Charles William Eliot, longtime president of Harvard University, editor of the Harvard Classics, and mentor to William Allan Neilson, editor of Webster’s Second. A remote and somewhat forbidding historical figure, but interesting.

  Bergen Evans, television host and co-author of a significant dictionary of usage, he crossed swords with Wilson Follett in a major debate over Webster’s Third.

  Wilson Follett, professor of English and author of a guide to modern usage. Possibly the most furious critic of Webster’s Third. Thought due to in “the event was canceled due to bad weather” was, like, really, really bad.

  Charles Carpenter Fries, scourge of old-fashioned grammar and evangelistic scholar who sought to bring American English teachers around to the scientific view of language. A swimming enthusiast.

  Gordon Gallan, former advertising director at Merriam and president of the company when Webster’s Third was published. Formidable businessman but not exactly a dyed-in-the-wool lexicographer.

  Grace Gove, wife to Philip, organic gardener, and co-author of a light satire used to commemorate the publication of Webster’s Third.

  Philip Gove, editor of Webster’s Third and, by far, the person most responsible for setting its editorial policies, as revealed in his personal papers, which include a copy of Merriam’s Black Books and minutes of key Editorial Board meetings.

  Sterling Andrus Leonard, along with Charles Carpenter Fries, one of the more memorable critics of classroom grammar in the 1920s and ’30s. Drowning victim.

  Dwight Macdonald, capitalist-turned-socialist-turned-anticommunist and author of the most memorable attack on Webster’s Third. His life as an intellectual and journalist serves as the closest thing to a cultural timeline in this book.

  H. L. Mencken, famed newspaper columnist and magazine editor who authored a well-known pioneering study of American English in 1919.

  Robert Munroe, successor to Asa Baker as president of Merriam, he was a traditionalist and very uncomfortable with Philip Gove’s plans for Webster’s Third.

  William Allan Neilson, assistant editor of the Harvard Classics and editor in chief of Webster’s Second. Scottish by birth, he brought a Victorian sensibility to his scholarship and his years as president of Smith College.

  James Parton, journalist and president of American Heritage publishing company who sought to use the controversy over Webster’s Third to take control of G. & C. Merriam Company.

  Noah Porter, editor of 1864 and 1890 editions of Webster’s dictionaries and president of Yale University.

  James Sledd, co-author of a book on Samuel Johnson and the most determined defender of Webster’s Third, which he didn’t even like that much.

  Ethel Strainchamps, newspaper columnist and author of Don’t Never Say Cain’t, a colorful memoir of growing up hillbilly in the Missouri Ozarks. It was too bad her defense of Webster’s Third wasn’t more arresting.

  W. Freeman Twaddell, professor of German at Brown University, he worked at Merriam-Webster in 1950 and said the time had come when their dictionary series could go without a famous “name” editor to lend prestige to its lexicography.

  Harry R. Warfel, longtime acquaintance and “friend” of Charles C. Fries, he wrote a book called Who Killed Grammar? Warfel’s answer: Charles C. Fries.

  Noah Webster, America’s founding lexicographer, he dreamed that a people united in its language would be politically and culturally inseparable. If the Civil War had not proven him wrong, the controversy over Webster’s Third certainly would have given him second thoughts.

  Acknowledgments

  A number of books appear and reappear in my notes but nevertheless deserve further mention. Prominent among them are Herbert C. Morton’s The Story of Webster’s Third: Philip Gove’s Controversial Dictionary and Its Critics and Michael Wreszin’s biography of Dwight Macdonald, A Rebel in Defense of Tradition, as well as his edition of Macdonald’s letters, A Moral Temper. That I disagree with Morton and Wreszin on several major points does not lessen my dependence on them or diminish my respect for their books. Another major resource for this book has been early issues of American Speech, which, along with Raven McDavid’s one-volume edition of H. L. Mencken’s American Language, gave me a number of ideas, large and small, about how to use the changing language and the contributions of linguistics to describe what I always saw as essentially a literary-intellectual drama.

  I am especially indebted to Norwood Gove for sharing some of his family papers with me. Peter H. Fries helped me understand some of the basic thrusts of his father’s research. E. Ward Gilman met with me and regaled me with stories about life at Merriam. Peter Sokolowski was always generous with his knowledge of dictionaries and Webster’s Third. They were all generous and collegial even as I aired thoughts that did not gel with their own feelings and opinions. Geoff Nunberg made a number of important observations and suggestions that shaped my thoughts on this story, while his e-mail correspondence over several years has helped me better understand how linguists approach language.

  Before writing this book, I wrote and published an article about Herbert Morton’s book about Webster’s Third in Humanities magazine, which is put out by the National Endowment for the Humanities, where I work. Maria Biernik, Meredith Hindley, Amy Lifson, Steve Moyer, and James Williford were, as always, good friends and good colleagues. Dona Bagley made us a lovely magazine cover. Thanks especially to managing editor Anna Gillis, who edited my article. Acting deputy chairman Michael McDonald was very helpful, and acting chairman Carole Watson was very gracious during this period. The views stated in this book are, of course, my own and not those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

  The late Dennis Dutton of Arts & Letters Daily helped to circulate my essay far and wide. His curatorial selections did so much to promote fine writing on the arts and humanities in recent years. Adam Keiper, editor of the New Atlantis, and Robert Messenger, then of the Weekly Standard, both read and commented on my Humanities essay. I appreciated the friendly criticism. I was also thankful to Mike Vuolo, then a producer
for On the Media, who interviewed me for a program on dictionaries and whose questions along the way helped me think about how to tell this story to a broader audience. Mark Liberman linked to and wrote about my essay on Language Log, a rather incredible resource on linguistics and, for me, an important resource for understanding how linguists think.

  After much additional research, including a visit to Laramie, Wyoming, to look over the Papers of Philip Gove, I developed a proposal for this book. Gove’s papers changed my view of the story of Webster’s Third and set me on a path to accumulating a new list of debts.

  I am grateful to NEH chairman Jim Leach and the Office of Human Resources for awarding me time off, or what is called an Independent Study Research Development grant, to work on this project. Mrs. McClish of the NEH library has been very helpful and kind. Judy Havemann, the agency’s director of communications, has been extremely considerate during a very busy couple of years. Meredith Hindley has been especially helpful with tips on dealing with archival materials.

  The current president of Merriam-Webster, John Morse, made one of the single most helpful suggestions about how to use the Merriam-Webster website to collate words by year.

  I am grateful for access to collections and for the assistance I received at Yale University’s Sterling Library, Harvard University’s Houghton Library, the Smith College Archives, and the University of Wyoming’s American Heritage Center. The wealth of materials waiting in all these libraries deepened my appreciation for the important archival resources of our country’s research libraries. At the Library of Congress I found many a helpful volume and among the open shelves of the Georgetown University Library I was able to finally put my hands on a copy of Barzun’s elusive American Scholar essay. I am also indebted to the online marketplace for enabling so many used and out-of-print books to become available at weirdly cheap prices, and to Google Scholar. I am also grateful to a number of scholars and writers who answered queries and recommended books and research relevant to this history.