Winner of the Pulitzer Prize “A masterwork . . . the novel astonishes with its inventiveness . . . it is nothing less than a grand comic fugue.”—The New York Times Book Review A Confederacy of Dunces is an American comic masterpiece. John Kennedy Toole's hero, one Ignatius J. Reilly, is "huge, obese, fractious, fastidious, a latter-day Gargantua, a Don Quixote of the French Quarter. His story bursts with wholly original characters, denizens of New Orleans' lower depths, incredibly true-to-life dialogue, and the zaniest series of high and low comic adventures" (Henry Kisor, Chicago Sun-Times).

The dictionary is based on a new concept which takes into account recent developments and findings in lexicographical research. It combines the best features of monolingual and bilingual dictionaries as well as learner dictionaries. Every sense of a word is first fully explained and then provided with translation equivalents. The grammatical behaviour of the words, their construction patterns are described in a language that is clear and easy to understand. Every sense of a word, every construction pattern is illustrated with an example. These example sentences are given in English and German so that the word looked up is shown in actual use and the translation guarantees its understanding and promotes retention. Special care is taken to explain differences between English and German in language use and culture. A new reader-friendly layout ensures that users will easily and speedily find the answer to what they want to know.