On the acknowledgements page of his gobsmackingly accomplished book The Adversary, Michael Crummey (author of the Scotiabank Giller Prize–shortlisted The Innocents) touches on the “looting and pilfering” that went into the writing of his sixth novel. In particular, he singles out the 1811 edition of Francis Grose’s Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue as an inestimable source.