Until the completion of the Oxford English Dictionary in 1905, Samuel Johnson's A Dictionary of the English Language was the dictionary of preference.  Born in Staffordshire, England, in 1709, Johnson was the son of a bookseller.  Samuel read voraciously in his father's shop.  About dictionaries he said, "Dictionaries are like watches.  The worst is better than none, and the best cannot be expected to go quite true."

In 1747 he issued a prospectus of a Dictionary of the English Language, which was to take him eight years to complete.  His great dictionary appeared in 1755, which "gave rise to a celebrated letter in which Johnson disdained an offer of patronage from Lord Chesterfield.  Johnson was awarded an honorary degree at Oxford, but he had to continue literary hack-work to earn a living."

 A few memorable definitions and quotations from Johnson:

Lexicographer.  A writer of dictionaries, a harmless drudge.

Network.  Anything reticulated or decussated at equal distances, with interstices between the intersections.

"Every man has a lurking wish to appear considerable in his native place."

"I'll come no more behind your scenes, David; for the silk stockings and white bosoms of your actresses excite my amorous propensities." (Said to theatrical impresario David Garrick.)

"Marriage has many pains, but celibacy has no pleasures."

~ CHAMBERS Biographical Dictionary, Editor Una McGovern,  Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd.,7th ed., 2002 with contribution from Lawrence Miller who refers to Johnson as, "The Great Bear, the Ursa Major who growls and shambles and towers over the eighteenth-century English literary world."  Thank you, Laurie.

Grand River Kayak ~

Bonnie Wardel Demonstrates Her Kayaking Skills

Son, Sean Wardel, Watches his Mom Pump Water

Ed Sullivan Wheels-In After Lessons 

Never Kayaked?  Let Ed Sullivan of Grand River Kayak Teach You How!  "Close to home. . . Far from ordinary!"  Weekend Course:  August 11th & 12th. 

Located: 2 Port Maitland Road, Dunnville, Ontario.  www.grandriverkayak.ca

(Please click on photo for larger image.)




Lake Erie, Selkirk, Ontario

 

Mermaids & Sea Creatures ~

Folk Art





 

(Note:  The artist's name will be posted if available.)

Please click on photo for larger image. lbwalker

"As much as I love to watch the water, and especially late in the day when the light shimmers, I sometimes spend hours at the Point  with my eyes closed so that I can focus on the surf as it breaks and rolls from left to right.  No sound system in the world, no symphony, can match the sound of those rollers."


James N. Allen Park, Lake Erie

 ~ Lawrence Scanlan, Harvest of a Quiet Eye ~ the cabin as sanctuary ~. Viking Canada, 2004.


Photo:  lbwalker

Smile For Today ~
Folk Art

~  ~

None of us want to think fall yet ~  however,

we are putting together a Fall Schedule for 1st & 3rd Thursdays at The Neat Little Bookshop.

Watch for Fascinating Personalities, Readings and Meet the Authors.  We think we have an exciting series planned.  Leave us your e-mail address, phone number or simply watch for announcements on the bookshop blog.

Contact us at:  lbwalker@shaw.ca , 905-577-5635 or leave a message at 905-772-5997.

Sharon's Garden, August, 2012

Frankie Surveying His Garden

Canadian conservationist and writer, Monte Hummel,* talks about

"getting to know a place so well that the boundary between landscape and self begins to dissolve, and what comfort that brings.

'Whatever this place may be," he writes, and here he's speaking generically about the special places that many of us know and cherish, 'it's a safe harbour that makes no unwelcome demands.  It serves as a source of sanity when everything else seems to be flying apart.  It is not an escape from reality, but a return to what really counts and what counts as real.'"

~ Harvest of a quiet Eye ~ the cabin as sanctuary, Lawrence Scanlan, Viking Canada, 2004.

* Wintergreen:  Reflections from Loon Lake.