Classics · 1911
The Devil’s Dictionary
A satirical lexicon, A to Z, redefining ordinary words with the driest possible cynicism: "PEACE, n. In international affairs, a period of cheating between two periods of fighting." "CORPORATION, n. An ingenious device for obtaining individual profit without individual responsibility." Many entries are illustrated with mock-attributed verses and anecdotes of Bierce's own invention, crediting fictional authorities and poets whose names are jokes in themselves.
Bierce began the work as a newspaper column in 1881, publishing a first, partial book collection in 1906 under the publisher-imposed title The Cynic's Word Book. The complete dictionary, restored to his preferred title, appeared in 1911 as part of his Collected Works — three years before he vanished in revolutionary Mexico, his fate never established.
Contents
New editions
Never lose your place.
This book is free to read in full, and stays that way. Leave an address: one click confirms it and opens a free account, so your progress and bookmarks sync across every device. You'll also hear when the next restored edition enters the archive. Terminate at any time.
Subjects
About this edition
The text is free of copyright. This edition was prepared from an authoritative digitisation, processed by Bibliomancer under its own review protocol; every automated correction is recorded in its transformation log. Rights assessed for CA, EU, GB, US.
Source mind
About the author
1842–1914 · Victorian
Ambrose Bierce (1842–c. 1914) was born in Meigs County, Ohio, and enlisted in the Union Army at nineteen, seeing heavy combat at Shiloh and Chickamauga and suffering a severe head wound at Kennesaw Mountain in 1864. After the war he settled in San Francisco and built a long career in journalism, much of it as a columnist for William Randolph Hearst's papers, where his caustic wit earned him the nickname "Bitter Bierce." His Civil War stories, including "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge," were collected as Tales of Soldiers and Civilians (1891), and his satirical lexicon, serialized in newspapers from 1881, was published in book form in 1906 as The Cynic's Word Book before appearing under its now-familiar title, The Devil's Dictionary, in 1911. In late 1913, in his early seventies, he traveled to Mexico, then in the midst of revolution, reportedly to observe Pancho Villa's army; he was last heard from in a letter dated December 1913, and neither his fate nor his remains were ever confirmed.
Adjacent records
