How to Write a Good Story

Using the Reverse Dictionary

A reverse dictionary is the greatest idea since sliced bread for writers. It solves the ever present problem we all face: 'What was that word again?'

What's the word for walking really fast in a determined manner? Try googling that, and you'll come up with the strangest mix of pages, but enter this into the Reverse Dictionary search tool, and it will give you a list of the most likely words to use, like bolt, scoot, stride, step, run, swagger, speed, hot-foot, etc.

You can narrow down the search by specifying whether the word you're looking for is a verb, noun, adjective or adverb.

This tool has been invaluable to me when I'm looking to write something 'common' in a fresh way, or word something that sounds wrong with more finesse and colour. It may not always give you exactly what you're looking for, but using the Reverse Dictionary along with a Thesaurus can double your vocabulary and bring depth to your writing.

Instead of, 'Peter walked down the road speedily and bumped straight into Ann.'

You could say, 'Peter bolted down the road, scattering dust behind him, and pummeled Ann when he barged straight into her.'

The Reverse dictionary is not, however, a quick fix for those of us who are too lazy to read and make other efforts to expand our vocabulary, but it is a useful tool when you're stuck trying to explain something, or when the dreaded 'writer's block' comes a-knockin'.

Find a great 'Reverse Dictionary' here:

http://www.onelook.com/reverse-dictionary.shtml

How to use OneLook's reverse dictionary feature:

OneLook's reverse dictionary lets you describe a concept and get back a list of words and phrases related to that concept. Your description can be a few words, a sentence, a question, or even just a single word. Just type it into the box above and hit the "Find words" button. Keep it short to get the best results. In most cases you'll get back a list of related terms with the best matches shown first.

Here are some possible applications, with examples:

Find a word if you know its definition:

barrel maker, museum guide,

search for food, urge to travel,

being tried twice for the same crime,

when cancer spreads through the body,

Explore related concepts:

baseball, clouds, twisty, push

·Generate a list of words in some category:

large birds, green fruit, Canadian authors

Answer basic identification questions:

What is the capital of Vietnam?

Who is Big Bird's friend on Sesame Street?

What is the longest river in the world?

Solve crossword puzzle clues, or find words if you only know some of the letters:

  (Use pattern:clue syntax)

??lon:synthetic fabric, s?nt?:christmas,l*ch*:fruit, ??????:hit, c*:board game

How does it work?

OneLook indexes hundreds of online dictionaries, encyclopedias, and other reference sites. By now you may have used the standard search available from the home page, which shows you a list of definition links for any word you type in. This is the reverse: Here we search our references for words that have definitions conceptually similar to the words you search for. We do this using a motley assortment of statistical language processing hacks.

Yikes. Why are so many of my search results complete nonsense?

For some types of searches only the first result or the first few results are likely to be useful. We urge you to click on a word to check its definition before using it in your Oscars acceptance speech or honors thesis. 

If you get back nothing but junk, try restating your query so that it's just two or three simple words. Some queries are very difficult for our system. That's because not every dictionary indexed by OneLook is used by the reverse dictionary, and our search algorithm still needs a lot of work. We're continually adding more references and improving the precision of the system.