16 reference works you never knew existed

by Laura Hale Brockway

Being a science and medical writer at my day job, I often end up spending more time researching an article than I do writing it. And after 14 years, I’ve come to relish the research phase.  When else can I so freely indulge my inner knowledge hound?

One of the greatest joys of researching is discovering unusual and obscure reference works. If you look hard enough, you’ll find a wealth of information about even the most obscure topic. Here are some of my favorites:

•  Benet’s Reader’s Encyclopedia — referred to as “the supreme reference on world literature,” this encyclopedia contains 10,000 entries on everything from author biographies to plot synopses.

 

•  The Dictionary of Imaginary Places — because you never know when you’ll need to look up the definition of Narnia.

 

•  Why Do We Say It?: The Stories Behind the Words, Expressions and Clichés We Use — a word nerds’ dream come true.

 

•  The Compleat Cast of Characters in Literature — features 8,000 entries from all literary genres.

 

• Gestures: The Do’s and Taboos of Body Language Around the World  — a reference book devoted to explaining the varieties of hand gestures in 82 countries.

 

•  Who’s Who in Hell: A Handbook and International Directory for Humanists, Freethinkers, Naturalists, Rationalists, and Non-Theists — they have those Who’s Who books for everyone.

 

•  TV Sets: Fantasy Blueprints of Classic TV Homes — features “extrapolated” blueprints from shows such as The Brady Bunch to the Adams Family. “Incredibly, all the plans are drawn to be architecturally feasible; that is, one could actually build from them.”

 

•  The Order of Things: Hierarchies, Structures, and Pecking Orders — explains the orders and classifications in science, religion, history, business, the arts, sports, technology, mathematics, society, and domestic life.

 

•  The Macmillan Visual Dictionary: 3,500 Color Illustrations, 25,000 Terms, 600 Subjects —“the only dictionary to allow you to see what you are looking up and to look up what you are seeing.”

 

•  Never Coming To A Theatre Near You —a collection of film reviews from Los Angeles Times and NPR film critic Kenneth Turan.

 

•  The Penguin Dictionary of Curious and Interesting Numbers — features entries on 1000 interesting numbers. Each entry provides odd little facts that give each number depth and suggest deeper patterns.

 

•  Dictionary of Symbols — a dictionary of 2,500 graphic symbols including each sign’s history, meaning, and classification system.

 

•  The History of Underclothes — a look at undergarments worn by the English over six centuries.

 

•  A Dictionary of the Underworld: British & American : Being the Vocabularies of Crooks, Criminals, Racketeers, Beggars and Tramps, Convicts, the Commercial Underworld, the Drug Traffickers — the title says it all.

 

•  Shakespeare’s Bawdy — a discussion of sexual and non-sexual expressions and allusions in the works of William Shakespeare. This reference book “puts the nudge and wink back in Shakespeare.”

 

•  Wye’s Dictionary Of Improbable Words: All-Vowel Words And All-Consonant Words — keep this one close by when playing Words with Friends.

 

Readers . . . any unusual reference books you’d like to share?

 

This article was first published on Ragan Communication’s PR Daily.

 

 

 

Comments are closed.