Thank Samuel Johnson for the Jane Austen Revival
Without his “Dictionary,” you probably wouldn't be able to make sense of “Sense and Sensibility”
Samuel Johnson
From Johnson's Dictionary: Myrmidon
myrmidon. Any rude ruffian; so named from the soldiers of Achilles.
(If you're interested in the Trojan War, this word isn't new to you. But it surprised me that it was apparently in currency during the 17th-18th centuries (probably 17th; Johnson refused to use books to
From Johnson's Dictionary
macaroon. A coarse, rude, low, fellow; whence macaronick poetry, in which the
language is purposely corrupted.
> Like a big wife, at sight of lothed meat,
> Ready to travail; so I sigh and sweat,
> To hear this macaroon talk on in vain. Donne