You think you like books and words? Consider writer (and former furniture mover) Ammon Shea, who devoted a year to reading the Oxford English Diction- ary. The result is the recently released "Reading the OED" (Perigee, $21.95, 240 pages).

For the record, the OED contains 59 million words on 21,730 pages in 20 volumes and sells for $895. On the dictionary's Web site (www.oed.com), the editors at Oxford University Press point out that the OED is "the accepted authority on the evolution of the English language over the last millennium."

I reached Shea at his apartment in New York City, where his shelves are crowded with 1,000 volumes of dictionaries, glossaries and other word-related books. Shea, 37, graduated from college last year (jazz studies) after a "15-year hiatus." Right now, he's working on a new project for print – "Lost and forgotten books."

Not to diminish your accomplishment, but why did you bother?

I wanted to make sure I hadn't missed anything. Whenever I look in a dictionary and come across great words, there's an inevitable feeling that I'm missing other great words.

I've been reading dictionaries for 12 years, and it's always a great story told differently every time. The OED tells it more magnificently than anybody else.

Basically, it was a year-long vacation. For me, reading a dictionary is no different than reading a great work of literature. If I have my choice of what to do on any given day, my druthers are to sit around and read.

You began the job by reading the OED in various locations but ended up in the basement of the Hunter College library. Sounds like a lonely vigil.

That depends on your definition of lonely. But that was the whole point – it's a remarkably quiet place for New York City. I was surrounded by books written in French, which I don't understand, or written about theater, which I don't care for. So there were few distractions.

What was the most taxing part of the project?

It wasn't when I was reading, but when I wasn't reading. I'd find my head so jumbled and filled with words that in large part I (temporarily) lost the ability to speak clearly. I became a bit of a moron.

Did your girlfriend have any problem with your yearlong preoccupation?

Alix is a former lexicographer, so if anything this was a little bit sexy.

You discovered some great words no longer in common usage. What were your favorites?

Desiderium is a remarkable word. It's a thing you no longer have but wish you did. Everybody can identify with that. A word like desiderium or a word like remord – to remember something with a touch of regret – are incredibly evocative. When I come upon those words, I can't help but stop reading and think about things from the past.

How has the experience changed you?

It's reinforced the notion that anything can be interesting to read if you approach it with a certain perspective. There is always something to be gotten from the written word, and it may not be what's obvious. There's a plot line hidden throughout a great dictionary, which may not be rational or even sane.

For instance, there are 33,000 citations for Shakespeare in the OED – just about all of "Hamlet" and God knows how many of his other plays. So if you read the whole thing, you're going to get Shakespeare waxing through your head constantly.

What's your take on defenestration – the act of throwing someone out a window?

It's an enormously popular word. People are delighted to learn that a conceptual idea has one specific word that applies to it. It's not terribly useful; we don't often throw people out of windows. But it's still marvelous to know that should we want to, we would know what to call it. It has a great evocative flair to it, not to mention violence. It's a great example of why I find so many (obscure) words so entrancing.

Call The Bee's Allen Pierleoni, (916) 321-1128.