The Professor and the Madman

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The Oxford English Dictionary is arguably one of the most important works for the English language, defining 414,825 words over 12 volumes with 227,779,589 letters (not including spaces and punctuation). It took over 70 years and three editors to complete. Thousands of volunteers in English-speaking countries contributed quotations and research to the project; this book focuses on one volunteer in particular, and the second editor of the OED.
William Minor was a military doctor during the American Civil War, and was certifiably insane. He submitted all of his research for the OED, over 10,000 quotes from his vast library, while institutionalized for a murder he committed in a London neighborhood. He suffered from paranoid delusions, and, though incredibly intelligent, today he is considered a paranoid schizophrenic. The professor of the title is James Murray, a leading British linguist and philologist who did not find about about Dr. Minor's scandalous history until several years into their OED correspondence. Upon discovering the truth about Dr. Minor, though, Murray took it upon himself to develop a friendship with the unsettled doctor, consistently writing letters to and visiting Minor.
Being a bit of a word nerd, this book was just fascinating. Winchester has done an impressive job of weaving together the stories of the two men, along with the massive undertaking of cataloging hundreds of thousands of words for the OED. His language is a bit formal, but fits perfectly with the time period that the book takes place during, and the behind-the-scenes look at the writing of a literary landmark is illuminating. Simon Winchester has trimmed the fat from this book, and it stands at less than 300 pages. One reviewer described this book as a "literary detective account," but I would prefer to think of it as an ode to a time when people cared about the words they used, the way they presented themselves to the world through language.