What effect did Shakespeare have on the Oxford English Dictionary and the English language?

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14. What effect did Shakespeare have on the Oxford English Dictionary and the English language?

The Oxford English Dictionary has throughout its existence been renowned as one of the greatest feats of editorial history, with worldwide recognition as the “most complete historical record of the English language ever assembled.” But with its creation came controversy over the acceptance, origins and sources of the words included, and very often a biased view can be seen towards the sources from which these words were derived as a result of the social class of the source. Studying the sources of the OED enables us to understand a lot about its history as well as the expectations of the lexicographers behind it, however when reviewing the sources, the emphasis put on the research and analyse of the lexis of one source in particular is very surprising, and this is the work of William Shakespeare.

The vocabulary in the work of William Shakespeare is so extensive as a result of war, exploration and colonization that at the time his plays contained an abundance of material of which lexicographers went about analysing, however it is important to note his prestige played a vital role in their acceptance of his work. In this essay I will aim to understand how the lexis and prestige of William Shakespeare helps to form the OED and in turn will gather information of how it has changed over time from this. Furthermore I will also highlight why Shakespeare was included so extensively in comparison to other writers and what the lexicographers expected to achieve from this.
There is no doubt that within the OED Shakespeare is the most thoroughly analysed source of quotations, and we can look at Shakespeare as a specific aspect to help illuminate the lexicographers desires for the OED to be as extensive as possible. Not just in the sense of providing the words of the English language, but the English language itself. Their use of Shakespeare meant that the lexicographers could use his extensive vocabulary of not only English words, but words from around the world. As a result of the renaissance, Shakespeare drew many of his words from abroad, hence by using him to such a great extent we are able to realise that the OED was designed to be as broad as possible, they were able to publish these words as English due to Shakespeare using them in publication, he “was the first to employ a great many of these words.”

Another conclusion made about the history of the OED is that because of the use of Shakespeare the 16th century is extremely well represented. By looking at how much and how accurately (a “reliability rate of 93.1%”
) he was used we can understand that in the history of the OED the “16th century was vastly better represented in the dictionary than any other”. Helping us to notice either the superiority of the lexicographers and their volunteers when analysing this era, or simply their bias, this extensive bias and use of Shakespeare does not help inform us of the history of the OED with regards to the English language, but the history of its creators.
When trying to understand how an astounding 33,300 words of the OED are a result of William Shakespeare we become very aware of its history and the intentions of the lexicographers at the time. We notice that although it is very true that the lexis of Shakespeare was extensive and far greater than any other at the time, the lexicographers in fact desired the inclusion of Shakespeare far more for their own benefit. They preferred the nature of his reputation and so felt by including him it would reflect on themselves as scholarly men. As Mugglestone says, “The OED documentation says more about the literary and linguistic predilections of the readers and lexicographers than about the standard printed language.”
 Hence we become aware that throughout the OED’s history there has been a suggested notion among the lexicographers that the sources of their work are just as important as the work itself.
This theory is reinforced by Brewer who highlights that throughout the development of the OED, we can notice that the majority of quotations come from those works of writers within the literary canon. From this we can deduce that within the OED’s history, the chosen quotations were favoured on the basis of “the values of the lexicographers and readers rather than the language itself.”

Hence during the growth and construction of the OED, we comprehend that a bias has always been visible among its creators, and therefore it is no surprise that by using Shakespeare in such vast amounts they hoped to emphasize their educated backgrounds and intelligence. The second most quoted source at the time was that of the bible, and it was said that “the bible and Shakespeare, it was thought, were still modern, current in the mind and speech of educated Englishmen.”
 By using these sources which at the time were studied and thought to be of cultural significance we can conclude that throughout the history of the OED there was an air of pretension and intellectual superiority.
As we have noticed so far, the lexicographers themselves played a crucial part in the history of the OED simply due to the fact they created it. It was a reflection of them as people and a society, hence the need to seem tasteful was vital, when making the OED the extensiveness of Shakespeare’s work reiterates the lexicographers desire for “taste and judgement” rather than simply literary fact. It seems as if they were almost using it to prove themselves as intelligent,

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“they did not excerpt Philemon Holland with the same care they bestowed on Shakespeare. It would have shown a sad want of literary taste and lexicographical judgement if they had done so; but would have made the dictionary a better store of linguistic information.”

This aids us in becoming aware that the desire to seem resourceful and knowledgeable by lexicographers in some sense hindered the OED from being a superior source of information.
Yet the vast use of Shakespeare’s work may help us to realise another fact about the lexicographers involved; although we know by now that the use of Shakespeare ...

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