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1000 Most Important Words: For Anyone and Everyone Who Has Something to Say

Based on the contention that we do not utillize speech to its fullest extent, this guide is an essential aide to unlocking our "passive" vocabularies and developing a keener appreciation of the richness of language.

Indispensable For Writers, Speakers, Teachers!
-- Enrich your vocabulary
-- Express yourself clearly -- and beautifully
-- Fun and easy to use!

256 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published July 12, 1982

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About the author

Norman W. Schur

17 books5 followers

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5 stars
40 (44%)
4 stars
27 (30%)
3 stars
15 (16%)
2 stars
4 (4%)
1 star
4 (4%)
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
Profile Image for Ezra Youngren.
52 reviews4 followers
April 22, 2025
Nice. Got kinda feminist near the end. I like the Latin derivatives though
Profile Image for Moses.
717 reviews
April 10, 2012
There are some fascinating and useful words, and some great etymological histories, but the example sentences are quite outdated. I don't know what the Entebbe crisis was, or I didn't until I googled it, and most people do not either--but Schur uses at least five different words to describe it.

All in all, a great way to expand your vocabulary. Some great words I learned:

catharsis, atavistic, fey, insouciant, nadir, sublimate, sylph, apotheosis.
Profile Image for Diana.
1 review1 follower
September 27, 2013
It would be useful book for somebody who wants to get lots of vocabularies.
There is no doubt that I've learnt valuable self-vocabulary lesson so far.
However this book requires for readers to have as much perseverance as possible since there's no picture or few interesting editorial setting.
What I want to remark about this book is, it's a good book to cram many words and useful idioms through various example texts(as suggested in the book) in a traditional way.
All the vocabularies are listed in alphabetical way.

One thing I want to suggest is, if there has an "Index category" at the last part, it would be much better for learners to revise and wrap up the words.

Despite of this weakpoint, I should admit that this book helps me enrich my vocabulary skill and broaden the linguistic arena (although it's not fun and easy way, haha).
Profile Image for Brian.
Author 15 books140 followers
March 16, 2012
I didn't expect it to be this good. Mr. Schur has an excellent selection that I wish I could have memorized. This is a vocab selection every writer should have in his back pocket. The definitions are also lean more to the 'Devil's Dictionary' style and away from the Meriam-Webster style. Fun.
Profile Image for J Crossley.
1,719 reviews18 followers
January 4, 2016
If you are looking to improve your vocabulary, this book will definitely help. I found the paperback version unwieldy, so I purchased the Kindle version.
93 reviews1 follower
March 1, 2021
Every once in a while it's good to breeze through a modest-sized dictionary like this.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews