Peter Roget
Encyclopedia
Peter Mark Roget FRS (icon; 18 January 1779 – 12 September 1869) was a British
physician
, natural theologian and lexicographer. He is best known for publishing, in 1852, the Thesaurus
of English Words and Phrases (Roget's Thesaurus
), a classified collection of related words.
. His obsession with list-making as a coping mechanism was well established by the time he was eight years old. The son of a Swiss
clergyman, Roget studied medicine
at the University of Edinburgh
. His life was marked by several incidents of sadness. His father and his wife died young. His beloved uncle Samuel Romilly
committed suicide in Roget's presence. Roget struggled with depression
for most of his life. His work on the thesaurus arose partly from an effort to battle depression.
Roget retired from professional life in 1840 and about 1848 began preparing for publication the one work that was to perpetuate his memory. This was the catalogue of words organized by their meanings, the compilation of which had been an avocation
since 1805. Its first printed edition, in 1852, was called Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases Classified and Arranged so as to Facilitate the Expression of Ideas and Assist in Literary Composition. During his lifetime the work had twenty-eight printings; after his death it was revised and expanded by his son, John Lewis Roget (1828–1908), and later by John's son, Samuel Romilly Roget (1875-?). The first secretary of the Portico Library
, Manchester, was Dr Roget who began his famous Thesaurus here.
Roget died while on holiday in West Malvern
, Worcestershire
, aged 90, and is buried there in the cemetery of St James's Church.
was only established in 1874. He was also one of the founders of the Medical and Chirurgical Society of London
, which later became the Royal Society of Medicine
, and he was a secretary of the Royal Society
. In 1815, he invented the log-log slide rule
, allowing a person to perform exponential and root calculations simply. This was especially helpful for calculations involving fractional powers and roots. In 1834 he became the first Fullerian Professor of Physiology at the Royal Institution
. He was examiner in physiology in the University of London.
On 9 December 1824, Roget presented a paper entitled Explanation of an optical deception in the appearance of the spokes of a wheel when seen through vertical apertures. This article is often incorrectly referenced as either On the Persistence of Vision with Regard to Human Motion or Persistence of Vision with regard to Moving Objects, likely due to erroneous citations by film historians Terry Ramsaye
and Arthur Knight (see Anderson and Anderson below).
While Roget's explanation of the illusion was probably wrong, his consideration of the illusion of motion was an important point in the history of film
, and probably influenced the development of the Thaumatrope
, the Phenakistiscope and the Zoetrope
.
He wrote numerous papers on physiology and health, among them the fifth Bridgewater Treatise, Animal and Vegetable Physiology considered with reference to Natural Theology (1834), a two-volume work on phrenology (1838), and articles for several editions of Encyclopædia Britannica
.
He played an important role in the establishment of the University of London
; he was a founder of the Society for the Diffusion of Knowledge and wrote for it a series of popular manuals. He showed remarkable ingenuity in inventing and solving chess problems and designed an inexpensive pocket chessboard.
Canadian writer Keath Fraser published a story, "Roget's Thesaurus," in 1982 which is narrated in Roget's voice. Minimalist in style, Fraser's story manages to capture both the associative power of language and many of the salient facts of Roget's life in a text that occupies less than two full pages.
Roget was the focus of the play "Synonymy" by Randy Wyatt. It tells the story of a graduate student named Gordon who rents out the last known residence of Roget to inspire him as he works on his dissertation regarding the English language and Roget's Thesaurus. The building, which was soon to be torn down, created a gateway in which Gordon found himself traveling back in time and meeting Roget and his daughter, Kate. "Synonymy" premiered at Minnesota State University's Department of Theatre and Dance in December 2005.
He is also a character in the play "An Experiment with an Air Pump
" by Shelagh Stephenson
, which concerns scientific ethics. The play takes place in the household of Joseph Fenwick in 1799 - Roget appears as one of Fenwick's assistants.
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
physician
Physician
A physician is a health care provider who practices the profession of medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring human health through the study, diagnosis, and treatment of disease, injury and other physical and mental impairments...
, natural theologian and lexicographer. He is best known for publishing, in 1852, the Thesaurus
Thesaurus
A thesaurus is a reference work that lists words grouped together according to similarity of meaning , in contrast to a dictionary, which contains definitions and pronunciations...
of English Words and Phrases (Roget's Thesaurus
Roget's Thesaurus
Roget's Thesaurus is a widely-used English language thesaurus, created by Dr. Peter Mark Roget in 1805 and released to the public on 29 April 1852. The original edition had 15,000 words, and each new edition has been larger...
), a classified collection of related words.
Biography
Peter Mark Roget was born in LondonLondon
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
. His obsession with list-making as a coping mechanism was well established by the time he was eight years old. The son of a Swiss
Switzerland
Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
clergyman, Roget studied medicine
Medicine
Medicine is the science and art of healing. It encompasses a variety of health care practices evolved to maintain and restore health by the prevention and treatment of illness....
at the University of Edinburgh
University of Edinburgh
The University of Edinburgh, founded in 1583, is a public research university located in Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland, and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The university is deeply embedded in the fabric of the city, with many of the buildings in the historic Old Town belonging to the university...
. His life was marked by several incidents of sadness. His father and his wife died young. His beloved uncle Samuel Romilly
Samuel Romilly
Sir Samuel Romilly , was a British legal reformer.-Background and education:Romilly was born in Frith Street, Soho, London, the second son of Peter Romilly, a watchmaker and jeweller...
committed suicide in Roget's presence. Roget struggled with depression
Depression (mood)
Depression is a state of low mood and aversion to activity that can affect a person's thoughts, behaviour, feelings and physical well-being. Depressed people may feel sad, anxious, empty, hopeless, helpless, worthless, guilty, irritable, or restless...
for most of his life. His work on the thesaurus arose partly from an effort to battle depression.
Roget retired from professional life in 1840 and about 1848 began preparing for publication the one work that was to perpetuate his memory. This was the catalogue of words organized by their meanings, the compilation of which had been an avocation
Avocation
An avocation is an activity that one engages in as a hobby outside one's main occupation. There are many examples of people whose professions were the ways that they made their livings, but for whom their activities outside of their workplaces were their true passions in life...
since 1805. Its first printed edition, in 1852, was called Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases Classified and Arranged so as to Facilitate the Expression of Ideas and Assist in Literary Composition. During his lifetime the work had twenty-eight printings; after his death it was revised and expanded by his son, John Lewis Roget (1828–1908), and later by John's son, Samuel Romilly Roget (1875-?). The first secretary of the Portico Library
Portico Library
The Portico Library on Mosley Street, Manchester is a subscription library built in the Greek Revival style between 1802-1806. It is a Grade II* listed building as at 25 February 1952....
, Manchester, was Dr Roget who began his famous Thesaurus here.
Roget died while on holiday in West Malvern
West Malvern
West Malvern is a village and a civil parish on the west side of the north part of the Malvern Hills at the western edge of Worcestershire, administered by the Malvern Hills District , and part of the informally defined area often referred to as the Malverns...
, Worcestershire
Worcestershire
Worcestershire is a non-metropolitan county, established in antiquity, located in the West Midlands region of England. For Eurostat purposes it is a NUTS 3 region and is one of three counties that comprise the "Herefordshire, Worcestershire and Warwickshire" NUTS 2 region...
, aged 90, and is buried there in the cemetery of St James's Church.
Roget in science and technology
Roget was much concerned with medical education but the School of Medicine at the University of ManchesterUniversity of Manchester
The University of Manchester is a public research university located in Manchester, United Kingdom. It is a "red brick" university and a member of the Russell Group of research-intensive British universities and the N8 Group...
was only established in 1874. He was also one of the founders of the Medical and Chirurgical Society of London
Medical and Chirurgical Society of London
The Medical and Chirurgical Society of London was a learned society of physicians and surgeons which was founded in 1805 by 26 personalities in these fields who had left the Medical Society of London because of disagreement with the autocratic style of its president, James Sims...
, which later became the Royal Society of Medicine
Royal Society of Medicine
The Royal Society of Medicine is a British charitable organisation whose main purpose is as a provider of medical education, running over 350 meetings and conferences each year.- History and overview :...
, and he was a secretary of the Royal Society
Royal Society
The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, known simply as the Royal Society, is a learned society for science, and is possibly the oldest such society in existence. Founded in November 1660, it was granted a Royal Charter by King Charles II as the "Royal Society of London"...
. In 1815, he invented the log-log slide rule
Slide rule
The slide rule, also known colloquially as a slipstick, is a mechanical analog computer. The slide rule is used primarily for multiplication and division, and also for functions such as roots, logarithms and trigonometry, but is not normally used for addition or subtraction.Slide rules come in a...
, allowing a person to perform exponential and root calculations simply. This was especially helpful for calculations involving fractional powers and roots. In 1834 he became the first Fullerian Professor of Physiology at the Royal Institution
Royal Institution
The Royal Institution of Great Britain is an organization devoted to scientific education and research, based in London.-Overview:...
. He was examiner in physiology in the University of London.
On 9 December 1824, Roget presented a paper entitled Explanation of an optical deception in the appearance of the spokes of a wheel when seen through vertical apertures. This article is often incorrectly referenced as either On the Persistence of Vision with Regard to Human Motion or Persistence of Vision with regard to Moving Objects, likely due to erroneous citations by film historians Terry Ramsaye
Terry Ramsaye
Terry Ramsaye was a film historian and author of A Million and One Nights ....
and Arthur Knight (see Anderson and Anderson below).
While Roget's explanation of the illusion was probably wrong, his consideration of the illusion of motion was an important point in the history of film
History of film
The history of film is the historical development of the medium known variously as cinema, motion pictures, film, or the movies.The history of film spans over 100 years, from the latter part of the 19th century to the present day...
, and probably influenced the development of the Thaumatrope
Thaumatrope
A thaumatrope is a toy that was popular in Victorian times.A disk or card with a picture on each side is attached to two pieces of string. When the strings are twirled quickly between the fingers the two pictures appear to combine into a single image due to persistence of vision.The invention of...
, the Phenakistiscope and the Zoetrope
Zoetrope
A zoetrope is a device that produces an illusion of action from a rapid succession of static pictures. The term zoetrope is from the Greek words "ζωή – zoe", "life" and τρόπος – tropos, "turn". It may be taken to mean "wheel of life"....
.
He wrote numerous papers on physiology and health, among them the fifth Bridgewater Treatise, Animal and Vegetable Physiology considered with reference to Natural Theology (1834), a two-volume work on phrenology (1838), and articles for several editions of Encyclopædia Britannica
Encyclopædia Britannica
The Encyclopædia Britannica , published by Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., is a general knowledge English-language encyclopaedia that is available in print, as a DVD, and on the Internet. It is written and continuously updated by about 100 full-time editors and more than 4,000 expert...
.
He played an important role in the establishment of the University of London
University of London
-20th century:Shortly after 6 Burlington Gardens was vacated, the University went through a period of rapid expansion. Bedford College, Royal Holloway and the London School of Economics all joined in 1900, Regent's Park College, which had affiliated in 1841 became an official divinity school of the...
; he was a founder of the Society for the Diffusion of Knowledge and wrote for it a series of popular manuals. He showed remarkable ingenuity in inventing and solving chess problems and designed an inexpensive pocket chessboard.
Roget in art and culture
Roget was the focus of the play "Synonymy" by Randy Wyatt. It tells the story of a graduate student named Gordon who rents out the last known residence of Roget to inspire him as he works on his dissertation regarding the English language and Roget's Thesaurus. The building, which was soon to be torn down, created a gateway in which Gordon found himself traveling back in time and meeting Roget and his daughter, Kate. "Synonymy" premiered at Minnesota State University's Department of Theatre and Dance in December 2005.
He is also a character in the play "An Experiment with an Air Pump
An Experiment with an Air Pump
An Experiment with an Air Pump is a play by British playwright Shelagh Stephenson inspired by the painting An Experiment on a Bird in the Air Pump by Joseph Wright. It shared the Peggy Ramsay Award for 1997, was first performed at the Royal Exchange Theatre, Manchester in 1998, and has since been...
" by Shelagh Stephenson
Shelagh Stephenson
Shelagh Stephenson is a playwright, born in Northumberland and read drama at Manchester University. Her stage plays include The Memory of Water , An Experiment with an Air Pump, Ancient Lights, Five Kinds of Silence and Mappa Mundi...
, which concerns scientific ethics. The play takes place in the household of Joseph Fenwick in 1799 - Roget appears as one of Fenwick's assistants.
See also
- Earl of Bridgewater for other Bridgewater Treatises
- LexicographyLexicographyLexicography is divided into two related disciplines:*Practical lexicography is the art or craft of compiling, writing and editing dictionaries....