About Brewer’s
A reference book like no other, Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase & Fable was originally a labour of love by general-knowledge enthusiast Dr Ebenezer Cobham Brewer. First published in 1870, it instantly won the hearts of the Victorian reading public with its uniquely varied content, and has never since been out of print.
The Brewer’s range of reference books has grown steadily over the past 139 years, and continues to flourish. From the flagship Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase & Fable – now in its eighteenth edition – to more recent works like Willie Donaldson’s hilarious Rogues, Villains and Eccentrics, all Brewer’s titles share the same exuberantly eclectic approach and cheerful disregard for the predictable that defined Dr Brewer’s original work.
‘Brewer’s headwords are so enticing and [its] definitions so eloquent that it’s impossible to stop at one. An addiction may develop.’ – Carol Rumens, The Independent
Take the scenic route to knowledge.
About Dr Brewer
What sort of man was Dr E. Cobham Brewer? Some clue was given in the brief ‘Memoir of Dr Brewer’ with which his grandson, Captain P.M.C. Hayman, introduced the centenary edition of Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase & Fable, spicing the plain facts of biography with childhood memories of his grandfather. (After the death of his wife in 1878, Dr Brewer had come to live with his eldest daughter and her husband, a vicar, in Nottinghamshire.)
‘Dr Brewer’, Captain Hayman wrote, ‘must have been nearly 80 years of age when I was old enough to remember him at the Vicarage. He had an upstairs room furnished as a bed-sitting-room, for he used to work far into the night, often until three or four in the morning. He always declared that he did his best work then – but he was always down to breakfast dead on time at nine o’clock.’
‘The walls of this room were papered with a plain white paper, upon which he used to write in pencil stray memoranda and the names of any particularly interesting visitors and the dates on which they came to see him. These names included that of the Duchess of Portland, then one of the most beautiful women in the country. She insisted on going upstairs to my grandfather’s own room and carried on a long conversation with him, sitting on his bed, a highly informal proceeding in those
days, which particularly pleased the old gentleman.’
‘He had a wonderful way with children and would put aside whatever he was doing to amuse the children of the house before they went to bed. He was a great hand at cutting out, drawing, telling stories, showing his “treasures” which he had collected in various countries and relating his experiences in France and at the Court of Napoleon III and his Empress. But it was his sense of humour, which he could adapt to the childish mind, which made Dr Brewer in his old age such a very delightful companion to the youngest of his grandchildren.’
‘He was also quite fearless. On one occasion the Vicarage odd-jobman – not remarkable for either intelligence or courage – came up to the house to announce that a rough-looking man was asleep in the stable. Before my father, a county cricketer and a noted sportsman, could move, Dr Brewer had seized a stick and, when the Vicar arrived at the stable, he found the old gentleman belabouring the trespasser, a hulking tramp, and exclaiming: “Be off, you scoundrel!” This onslaught was too much for the tramp, who made off as hard as he could go.’
More biographical information about Dr Brewer and his work can be found in John Buchanan-Brown’s introduction to Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase & Fable, from which the above extract is taken.