THE WORTH OF A DICTIONARY

 

Years ago and in Telemadrid, Fernando Sánchez-Dragó, the Spanish journalist, novelist, tv personality, and thinker had an evening news program that tried, successfully, to be culturally a notch above competitors. One evening, he interviewed the then popular sociologist Amando de Miguel and, as it was his custom, Fernando presented his guest with a book. I was pleasantly surprised to see that it was my Diccionario del argot, el Sohez. Amando de Miguel said: "Let me see if this word is in here" and proceeded to flip pages in search of "the word". My blood froze in my veins. I knew that if the word was not included, the dictionary would lose all its credibility in front of thousands of viewers. Luckily the word was in the dictionary and I sighed with relief. But I never forgave Amando de Miguel for that. I suspected that he was hoping the word, whatever it was, was missing from my pages. However large a dictionary is, if the word you are looking up is not included, the whole work is considered worthless. And all words cannot be included.