Revisionary Texts: Examining the Editors' Proofs of OED1

Abstract

ABSTRACT:In 2021, the final Editors' Proofs of the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary were a surprise discovery in the Bodleian Library, Oxford. Signed, dated, and liberally annotated by all four editors, as well as by the press-room workers at Oxford University Press, these proofs document a liminal stage immediately before publication, detailing the editors' final cuts and the challenges (and compromises) that latestage editing can reveal. As this article explores, the Proofs represent a substantial contribution to the material history of the OED and of the constraints of lexicography in the age of hot metal. Shedding new light on the ways in which, under pressures of space, key questions about expendability and inclusion were negotiated between different communities of practice, the Proofs present a visible testimony of change, substitution, and loss.