John Stephen Farmer

author

John Stephen Farmer

1854–1916

Best known for a landmark seven-volume dictionary of slang, this Victorian-era writer explored the lively, unofficial side of English. He also moved through very different worlds, working as a publisher, editor, and spiritualist lecturer.

5 Audiobooks

Musa Pedestris - Three Centuries of Canting Songs and Slang Rhymes [1536 - 1896]

Musa Pedestris - Three Centuries of Canting Songs and Slang Rhymes [1536 - 1896]

by John Stephen Farmer

The Public School Word-book A conribution to to a historical glossary of words phrases and turns of expression obsolete and in current use peculiar to our great public schools together with some that have been or are modish at the universities

The Public School Word-book A conribution to to a historical glossary of words phrases and turns of expression obsolete and in current use peculiar to our great public schools together with some that have been or are modish at the universities

by John Stephen Farmer

Slang and its analogues past and present, volume 2 [of 7] : A dictionary, historical and comparative, of the heterodox speech of all classes of society for more than three hundred years. With synonyms in English, French, German, Italian, etc.

Slang and its analogues past and present, volume 2 [of 7] : A dictionary, historical and comparative, of the heterodox speech of all classes of society for more than three hundred years. With synonyms in English, French, German, Italian, etc.

by John Stephen Farmer, William Ernest Henley

Slang and its analogues past and present, volume 3 [of 7] : A dictionary, historical and comparative, of the heterodox speech of all classes of society for more than three hundred years. With synonyms in English, French, German, Italian, etc.

Slang and its analogues past and present, volume 3 [of 7] : A dictionary, historical and comparative, of the heterodox speech of all classes of society for more than three hundred years. With synonyms in English, French, German, Italian, etc.

by John Stephen Farmer, William Ernest Henley

Slang and its analogues past and present, volume 1 [of 7] : A dictionary, historical and comparative, of the heterodox speech of all classes of society for more than three hundred years. With synonyms in English, French, German, Italian, etc.

Slang and its analogues past and present, volume 1 [of 7] : A dictionary, historical and comparative, of the heterodox speech of all classes of society for more than three hundred years. With synonyms in English, French, German, Italian, etc.

by John Stephen Farmer, William Ernest Henley

About the author

Born in Bedford, England, on March 7, 1854, John Stephen Farmer became a British lexicographer, writer, and editor with a lasting reputation for studying slang and colloquial speech. He is most closely associated with Slang and Its Analogues Past and Present, the ambitious seven-volume work he produced with W. E. Henley.

Farmer’s career ranged widely. He worked in publishing and journalism, edited collections of older English literature, and wrote on spiritualism as well as language. That mix of interests helps explain why his work feels both scholarly and curious about everyday life: he paid attention not only to formal English, but to the words people actually used in streets, schools, clubs, and workplaces.

He died on January 18, 1916. Today he is remembered chiefly for preserving the history of slang in unusual depth, giving later readers and researchers a vivid record of how informal English changed over time.