Clear definitions of some of the more unusual and troublesome words in the English language.

As far as the practical needs of users are concerned, it makes much better sense to include only words that they are likely to look up. The space saved by omitting the likes of and , be, do, house , and small can be much more profitably given to words whose meaning, spelling, pronunciation, etc. cause problems.
That is the idea behind The Hutchinson Dictionary of Difficult Words. It is a compendium of around 14,000 of the more troublesome and obscure words in the English language. It gives you access to the farthest reaches of English vocabulary, including within its modest compass terms that can otherwise be found only in the largest multi-volume unabridged dictionaries and specialist reference books. It is not a dictionary to be left on the shelf, but a practical problem-solver whose every entry serves a purpose.