• 'Review from previous edition If you have bookshelves, shed them of the useless and find room for this . . .. This verbal nourishment is overwhelming.' -Anthony Burgess, Observer
• '. . . astonishingly good value . . . the new SOED is all that one would expect of it.' -Keith Waterhouse, Daily Mail
• 'The Shorter demands a shelf, but one very close to the desk of anyone who cares about words.' -Daily Telegraph
• 'It is a masterpiece and should be the cornerpiece of every literate home.' -Irish Times
• 'It may be difficult to carry, but not to read' -Erich Segal, Times Literary Supplement
• 'It must be difficult trying to come up with a bright marketing technique to sell the fifth edition of the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary ...but the OUP seems to have managed it. On the box housing the two volumes of this mighty enterprise is a picture of a white-bearded gentleman in a cloak who, at first blush, appears to be J. K. Rowling's Albus Dumbledore. However, it is Sir James Murray (1837-1915), the first Editor of the real, 21-volume Oxford English Dictionary, of which the Shorter is an honest abridgement. More than half a million definitions are presented in clear type, set big enough for all but the most long-sighted.' -Chris Campling, Times
• '. . . truly a dictionary of global English.' -Sydney Morning Herald
• 'It is a dictionary with zest . . . a rare treasure.' -Frank Devine, The Australian
• 'The Shorter is a mine of information.' -Toronto Star

• Major new edition based on the twenty-volume Oxford English Dictionary, with over 3,500 new words and meanings drawn from research done for the new edition of the OED
• More than a third of the content of the OED in one tenth of the size
• Over half a million definitions: extensive coverage of new words and also contains all major words in English used after 1700
• Thousands of illustrative quotations: 83,000 quotations from 7,000 authors
• Extensive coverage of English from around the world
• Provides details of many rare and obsolete words
• Covers the vocabulary of Shakespeare, Milton, Spenser's Faerie Queene, and the King James Bible
• Entries show historical development by listing meanings chronologically and giving datings for first use of each sense
• New open design makes entries easy to navigate and information easy to find
• The First Edition, a 2 volume abridged version of the Oxford English Dictionary, was published 1933. The Second edition was published 1936 with 3,000 revisions and additions. The Third Edition was published 1944 with appendix of addenda and corrigenda. This edition was reprinted several times with corrections and additions, the most significant being in 1973, with enlarged addenda. The New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary was published 1993. This was a reabridgement of the OED and its supplements. For this new edition in 2002 the title has changed back to the original Shorter Oxford English Dictionary to emphasize the link with the 20-volume OED, and the text has been thoroughly updated with thousands of new words.
• This title replaces the New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary plain and thumb index editions: ISBNs 0-19-861134-x and 0-19-861271-0

Publication history: The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary was envisaged from the beginning as an abridgement of the Oxford English Dictionary (OED). The first editor, William Little, was appointed in 1902. He worked on it until his death in 1922, after which the dictionary was completed by H. W. Fowler, Jessie Coulson, and C. T. Onions. The First Edition was published in 1933, in two volumes.

The Second Edition (1936) contained about 3,000 revisions and additions. The Third Edition (1944) contained an appendix of addenda and corrigenda, and this edition was reprinted several times with corrections and additions, the most significant being in 1973, with enlarged addenda (now running to over 70 pages) and a major revision of all the etymologies.

The `New Shorter' was prepared under the editorship of Lesley Brown 1980-1993. It was the first complete revision of the dictionary, being in fact not so much an overhaul of the existing text as a reabridgement of the OED and its Supplements. The New Shorter also included much material not yet published by OED.

This Fifth Edition is an update of the New Shorter with thousands of new words. The title has changed to the original 'Shorter Oxford English Dictionary' to emphasize the link between this 2-volume dictionary and the original 20-volume OED.

• List of lexicographers
• Preface
• Guide to the use of the Dictionary
• Transliteration
• Abbreviations and symbols
• Key to the Pronunciation
• The Dictionary A-M volume 1
• The Dictionary N-Z volume 2
• Authors and publications quoted
• References to the Bible
• References to Shakespeare