John Entick's and Ann Fisher's dictionaries: An eighteenth-century case of (cons)piracy?

Abstract

In the eighteenth century a combination of economic and social circumstances gave rise to a debate over the notions of authorship and originality in London. The growing diffusion of printed works caused an increasing popularity of certain authors who were on the way to professionalization. An accurate attribution of works became thus a key point in their careers and incomes, but also in those of influential booksellers who, zealous of their business, used their power to protect their investment. This zeal, notwithstanding, did not prevent authors from copying, using and imitating other authors without acknowledging their sources. Such a practice caused problems of authorship, as in the case of the dictionaries written by Entick, The New Spelling Dictionary (1765), and by Fisher, An Accurate New Spelling Dictionary and Expositor of the English Language (17732). In a small set of letters written by Ann Fisher and some unpublished draft copies of the preface to her dictionary, she defends herself against a charge of piracy in which Entick's dictionary was involved. In these documents she not only denounces the falsity of these accusations but also tackles the question of authorship/originality in the production of dictionaries. The aim of this paper is to check Fisher's line of defence by, first, comparing both dictionaries and, second, briefly revising the eighteenth-century lexicographers’ practice of using an array of sources to devise their dictionaries.