Another work of adaptation, now in progress, illustrates further the possibilities of Anglo-American co-operation. The Concise Oxford Dictionary of current English, adapted from the great Oxford Dictionary, has been and is very widely used throughout the British Empire and by students of English in foreign countries. But its spelling, and certain other features, were found to disqualify the book for general use in the United States; and a special American edition is now in preparation, the adapter of which is Mr. G. Van Santvoord, of Oriel College, Oxford, and Yale University.
The Press is publisher, on both sides of the Atlantic, to the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, many of whose books have been printed at Oxford. Special mention may be made of the first volumes, printed at the Press and recently published, of the British Section of the great Economic and Social History of the World War undertaken by the Endowment. These volumes are by Professors Keith and Bowley and Mr. J. A. Salter.
IV
OXFORD BOOKS
§ 1. Oxford Series
At one time Oxford books were produced almost always at the instance of an author; and many Oxford books are still so produced. A scholar having devoted, it may be, many years of his life to a subject which he has made his own, applies to the University Press for publication of his researches; and such a claim is often admitted as irresistible. In modern times, however, the need for organization by the publisher has become increasingly apparent. Many books which if published in isolation would reach only a small public are found capable of a wider usefulness when issued as part of a larger plan; and thus the initiative in publishing passes more and more into the hands of the professional commanding the advice of a body of experts. School-books, reprints of the Classics, text-books of the applied sciences, and books of the nature of Dictionaries and Encyclopaedias are now almost always conducted in this way by co-operative enterprise.