Reviewers often like to start with a simple statement of what a book is all about. In the present case, this is difficult, because there are two books within these covers. The first three chapters fit its subtitle, ‘The Story of the Australian National Dictionary’, while the next seven fit the title Lexical Images, being essays on aspects of Australian history and culture as reflected in the pages of the Australian National Dictionary (1988). If a single theme has to be extracted, it is that historical lexicography is a fascinating process, generating a valuable product.

The opening chapter places the AND project in its context, with a succinct and lucid account of what a ‘dictionary on historical principles’ is all about, and its relationship to the reference dictionaries we have for daily use. The chapter outlines the methodology developed by Sir James Murray for the Oxford English Dictionary and explains how this was applied to the Australian project.

The second chapter provides an inside account of the stoushes between the various parties who were, or thought they were, or wanted to be, involved in the project. The heroes, notably David Cunningham, former managing director of Oxford University Press Australia, are splendidly heroic, and the villains, particularly those whose only villainy was a patriotic desire to keep the project in all-Australian hands, are presented with understanding. Bill Ramson is, of course, partisan: he was Editor of AND, and founding director of the Australian National Dictionary Centre at the ANU. One can hardly expect detachment from somebody so deeply involved, but Ramson explains the order of battle very well.