Novo Dicionario Houaiss da Lingua Portuguesa [Portuguese]

by Antônio Houaiss

Book Overview

No Synopsis Available.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: Portuguese
• ISBN: 8573029633
• Release Date: January 2009
• Publisher: Objetiva
• Length: 1986 Pages
• Weight: 6.10 lbs.
• Dimensions: 2.1" x 8.6" x 11.1"

Customer Reviews

The best Portuguese dictionary, but not that expensive

The "Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa", with 228,500 entries, is the biggest Portuguese dictionary available, and the third biggest in any language. I use it whenever I read a word that I don't know. I often carry it with me in my backpack, although it weighs some 6.6 pounds. The level of detail in the definitions makes the dictionary authoritative. Also, it has features that you can't usually find in other dictionaries (even "The New Oxford Dictionary of English"). For example, if you look for "parrot", after the definition you'll find a set of verbs that represent the parrot's making a noise: "chalrar, charlar, falar, palrar, palrear, taramelar, taramelear, tartarear, vozear." Also, whenever it's possible, it shows the evolution of words throughout time, considering evidence from literature: abat-jour (1880), abaju (1899) and abajur (1880 and currently). But this dictionary is less expensive in Brazil. (...)

Complete, but...

This is currently the most complete dictionary of the Portuguese language as spoken in Brazil. It comes in good binding, and should you want to become proficient in Brazilian Portuguese it will sure be useful. That said, there are some caveats. Antônio Houaiss had a really hard ear for language — he got most of his exposure not for his taste in language but for his Leftist militancy. As a result, his dictionary is not nearly as nice a read as the slightly smaller, less up-to-date Aurélio. If you can live with a few obscure entries less, without the latest slang and a somewhat inferior binding, Aurélio will give you more concise, clear, useful and even beautiful explanations. You could even wait for a few weeks and get the soon-to-be-published new edition of the Aurélio by Positivo, which in its augmentative form (Aurelião) is a Brazilian synonym for a big dictionary. Also, if you really want something equivalent to the Oxford English Dictionary or the Frech Robert, wait a few months and you should have a new, expanded edition of the classic Caldas Aulete by Nova Fronteira. Finally, Houaiss was the main proponent of the ill-fated Orthographic Reform that would have unified Brazilian and Portugal spelling. While it has been passed into law, it wasn't done in the deadlines imposed by the Treaty between both countries and to boot was very impopular in Brazil, who already has a quite regular spelling well suited to its pronounciation. So what you see in this dictionary isn't necessarily what Brazilian people write — for example, only one of the main newspapers, and a less prestigious one, adopted some features of the reform.