No ordinary dictionary, David Crystal's Dictionary of Language includes not only descriptions of hundreds of languages literally from A to Z (Abkhaz to Zyryan) and definitions of literary and grammatical concepts, but also explanations of terms used in linguistics, language teaching, and speech pathology. If you are wondering how many people speak Macedonian, Malay, or Makua, or if you're curious about various theories of the origins of language, or if you were always unsure of the difference between structuralism, semiotics, and sociolinguistics, this superbly authoritative dictionary will answer all of your questions and hundred of others.

David Crystal is the Honorary Professor of Linguistics at the University of Wales, Bangor. His previous books include The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language, English as a Global Language, A Dictionary of Linguistics and Phonetics, Language Death, and Words on Words, the last published by the University of Chicago Press.

— Nicholas Lezard, The Guardian