PROFESSOR LEV SKVORTSOV'S DICTIONARIES OF THE RUSSIAN LANGUAGE

This article focuses on the work of Professor Lev Ivanovich Skvortsov as a lexicographer, explores the main dictionaries he was involved in as a creator and an editor, as well as new dictionaries composed by Professor Skvortsov himself, characterizes them and establishes their practical value.
Standard dictionaries, including spelling dictionaries, dictionaries of grammatical Russian speech and explanatory dictionaries are most demanded in the society. The Large Spelling Dictionary of the Russian Language (BOS), containing more than 106,000 words, under the editorship of Stepan Barkhudarov, Ivan Protchenko and Lev Skvortsov, continue the heritage of academic Spelling Diction ary of the  Russian Language published in 30 editions. The new dictionary included a lot of recent terms from various areas of knowledge as well as data from modern everyday speech.
Many years of language observation resulted in the Large Explanatory Dictionary of Grammatical Russian Speech (8,000 words) dated 2005, 2006 and 2016. It became popular among experts and all people interested in issues of correct speech. This is an explanatory dictionary of prescriptive and stylistic kind first introduced in the Russian lexicography. It served as a basis for a more compact School Dictionary on Culture of Spoken Russian. As for the general reader, the “Culture of Spoken Russian” dictionary by Professor Lev Skvortsov, reissued and revised, was introduced. This is an all-purpose dictionary on pronunciation and stress, formation of grammatical forms and structures, verb and nominal government, word building and phraseology, containing 3,000 entries.
Speaking of the main explanatory dictionaries, we cannot overlook the Explanatory Dictionary of the Russian Language by Sergey Ozhegov, which runs through numerous editions. One of the recent editions, the 25th one, has been issued in 2006 under the editorship of Professor Skvortsov; it contains around 65,000 words and idioms. This edition of the dictionary includes a fair amount of new words and expressions (more than 3,000) reflecting changes in social and political, scientific, and cultural life of Russia. Moreover, modern linguistic processes were also taken into account. Professor Skvortsov worked on bringing Ozhegov’s dictionary closer to present days.
The last and the most significant work of Professor Skvortsov was the Large Explanatory and Expository Dictionary of the Russian Language. Despite it wasn’t finished, the materials collected were enough to publish the first volume. It represents a new kind of explanatory dictionary of the Russian language. The author noted this himself, emphasizing that that was the new type of dictionary which “together with proper linguistic data also includes general historical and terminological knowledge, details from everyday life and extralinguistic information”.
The article ends with a conclusion that Professor Skvortsov performed a tremendous task, leaving us a vast linguistic heritage. His remarkable diligence, wealth of knowledge and love for his native Russian language made it possible. His dictionaries listed above are of great importance: all of them undoubtedly help their readers to raise their level of Russian proficiency, to speak and to write correctly; these dictionaries can be immensely useful in classes of Modern Russian, Culture of Speech, and Practical Stylistics. Everybody - especially students and experts, both in humanities and engineering areas - would benefit from using these dictionaries.

Lexicography, standard dictionaries, spelling dictionaries, dictionaries of grammatical Russian speech, explanatory dictionaries, explanatory and expository dictionary

1. Barkhudarov S.G., Protchenko I.F., Skvortsov L.I. Bol’shoi orfograficheskii slovar’ russkogo iazyka. Bolee 106000 slov [Large spelling dictionary of the Russian language.Over 106000 words]. Moscow, Oniks Publ., Mir i Obrazovanie Publ., 2007. 1152 p. (In Russian).

2. Blagova A.R. Ispol’zovanie slovarei na zaniatiiakh v ramkakhkursa «Sovremennyi russkii iazyk» [Using dictionaries in the classroom as part of the modern Russian language course]. Mezhdunarodnye kommunikatsii - International Communications, 2019, no. 1. Available at: http://intcom-mgimo.ru/ (accessed 2 September 2019) (In Russian).

3. Blagova A.R. Osobennosti opredelenii znachenii slov v tolkovo-ob”iasnitel’nom slovare russkogo iazyka [Features of definitions of meanings of words in explanatory dictionary of Russian language]. Mezhdunarodnye kommunikatsii - International Communications, 2017, no. 5. Available at: http://intcommgimo.ru/ (accessed: 2 September 2019) (In Russian).

4. Ozhegov S.I. Slovar’ russkogo iazyka: Ok. 60000 slov i frazeologicheskikh vyrazhenii [Dictionary of the Russian language: approx. 60000 words and phraseological expressions]. Moscow, Oniks Publ., Mir i Obrazovanie Publ., 2006. 976 p. (In Russian).

5. Skvortsov L.I. Bol’shoi tolkovo-ob”iasnitel’nyi slovar’ russkogo iazyka: A-M. (Murash, Murashka) [Large explanatory dictionary of the Russian language: A-M. (Murash, Murashka)]. Moscow, Mir i Obrazovanie Publ., 2017. 1312 p. (In Russian).

6. Skvortsov L.I. Bol’shoi tolkovyi slovar’ pravil’noi russkoi rechi: Bolee 8000 slovivyrazhenii [Large explanatory dictionary of correct Russian speech: More than 8000 words and phrases]. Moscow, Mir i Obrazovanie Publ., 2016. 1104 p. (In Russian).

7. Skvortsov L.I. Kul’tura russkoi rechi: Slovar’-spravochnik: Ucheb. Posobie dlia stud. vyssh. uch. zavedenii [Culture of Russian Speech: Dictionary-Reference: Textbook. Manual for students.higher student institutions]. Moscow, Akademiia Publ., 2003. 224 p. (In Russian).

8. Skvortsov L.I. Shkol’nyi slovar’ po kul’ture russkoi rechi [School dictionary on the culture of Russian speech]. Moscow, Drofa Publ., 2010. 432 p. (In Russian).

9. Skvortsov L.I., Blagova A.R. O novom tipe tolkovogo slovaria russkogo iazyka [About new type of explanatory dictionary of the Russian language]. Aktual’nye problem prepodavaniia russkogo iazyka kak inostrannogo v vuze: materialy Tret’ei mezhdunarodnoi nauchno-metodicheskoi konferentsii [Actual problems of teaching Russian as foreign language at university: materials of the Third International Scientific and Methodological Conference]. Moscow, MGIMO-Universitet Publ., 2014. pp. 103-109 (In Russian).

10. Skvortsov L.I., Blagova A.R. Tendentsii razvitiia sovremennogo russkogo iazyka I leksikograficheskaia praktika nashikh dnei [Trends in the development of the modern Russian language and the lexicographical practice of our days]. Materialy I Mezhdunarodnoi nauchno-metodicheskoi konferentsii «Russkii iazyk – posrednik v dialoge kul’tur» (V ramkakh programmy «Russkii iazyk v XXI veke») [Materials of the I International Scientific and Methodological Conference «Russian Language as an Intermediary in the Dialogue of Cultures» (As part of the program «Russian Language in the 21st Century»]. Moscow, MGIMO-Universitet Publ., 2009. pp. 21-30. (In Russian).