Is it possible that at one time it was intended to do just this, and is the Macropaedia the fossil record of an abandoned intention? Previous editions had scattered them, according to the whims of the alphabet, among a host of shorter, factual entries.” The major articles are still scattered in the Macropaedia according to the whims of the alphabet, and it would be interesting to know why the editors did not organize them topically rather than alphabetically, a practice with distinguished antecedents in the history of encyclopedias. They merely assert its desirability: “It made eminent sense to collect these major articles into one part of the encyclopaedia. But nowhere in Britannica 3 or its publicity have its editors justified their decision to isolate the two types physically. There is something to be said for distinguishing between topics best dealt with in small fragments and those best integrated into larger and more comprehensive essays. But the dismembering of the body of the Britannica into mini- and maxi-pedias is not only devoid of benefits, it has also given us the spectacle of a ten-volume index for a nineteen-volume work. The Propaedia, at least, is harmless, for there is nothing in it that might profitably have been printed elsewhere. This arrangement has nothing to recommend it except commercial novelty. This third section contains the major articles and runs to nineteen volumes. The second section, the Micropaedia, comprises ten volumes containing brief articles (750 words or less), voluminous cross-references (the only alphabetical index supplied with Britannica 3), and abstracts of the 4,027 articles contained in the major segment of the encyclopedia, which is known as the Macropaedia. The Propaedia fills one volume and contains a variety of ancillary material as well as an elaborate subject-index arranged according to one of those comprehensive partitions of all knowledge familiar to anyone who has come within hailing distance of the Great Books.
A more accurate, but perhaps less merchandisable, way of putting it would be “3 Britannicas.” Or “ Britannica in Thirds.” The first section is known for some reason as the Propaedia, a term which must have been coined by the editors, since it occurs in no known language. But it is not clear whether the plan is an improvement, or merely an eccentric innovation.Īlthough known on its title page as the 15th edition, the new work is merchandised as Britannica 3. There is no doubt that it is planned, and with a vengeance.
The present edition was undertaken, among other reasons, to restore a sense of plan to the Britannica. As a result, the encyclopedia 2 had gradually lost coherent design, and had become a collection of increasingly unrelated articles. As he explains it in his Preface, the structure of the Britannica had grown visibly more obscure over the years because revision-begun on a yearly basis in 1936-had been carried out with little regard for the original plan of the work. The decision to overhaul was undertaken, according to the editor, partially on structural grounds. The recently-published 15th edition 1 represents the first thorough reworking of the Britannica since 1929. In public reputation, the Britannica has no serious rival, and a copy of the current edition is an essential in each of the country’s thousands of public and educational libraries. For over half a century, it has been published in the United States under American ownership, including that of Sears, Roebuck & Co. The Encyclopaedia Britannica is, despite its name, an American institution.
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