Spanish copyeditor's dictionary wanted

April 19, 2010 6:10 PM

I'm looking for a Spanish dictionary that includes word breaks. Is there anybody here who copyedits Spanish text and can recommend the gold standard for such a task?

We have searched all over our very bookstore-laden town and not one dictionary showed proper word breaks.

Bonus points for recommendations for English-speaking websites/blogs that have forums for Spanish-language editors.

posted by Camofrog to writing & language (6 answers total)

I doubt you'll be able to find a dictionary like that as words in Spanish can be divided syllabically as needed, following these rules.

From a previous question (which also has tips), some of the rules translated to english.
posted by Memo at 6:41 PM on April 19, 2010

Ah, thanks Memo. That

I guess I should add that I am not a fluent Spanish reader/speaker, and I'd still love a specific dictionary recommendation, because there are always tough calls in any language.
posted by Camofrog at 7:58 PM on April 19, 2010

oops, forgot to finish my first sentence, which was going to say thanks for pointing to the earlier question.
posted by Camofrog at 8:01 PM on April 19, 2010

The Larousse is considered top notch.
posted by theKik at 9:06 PM on April 19, 2010

First, if you are good enough in Spanish to worry about close calls, you should move into a Spanish-Spanish dictionary.

Second, for dead-tree, Larousse is definitely my go-to brand for dictionaries now, and I have three or four varieties of their Spanish dictionaries. These are battered and well-loved; their inferior colleagues including Langenscheidt, Vox, and one with an orange red and white cover and very blurry type that I detested so much I can't think of the name. If you can't find Larousse, I have also had good experience with Oxford in other languages but have never used it for Spanish.

Third, you can use the online version of the Diccionario de la Real Academia Espanola for frees!
posted by whatzit at 12:07 PM on April 20, 2010 [1 favorite]

I went with The Concise American Heritage Spanish Dictionary, 2nd Ed. (Houghton Mifflin). Not as comprehensive as Larousse, I'm sure, but it does have syllable breaks and it's good enough for our purposes.
posted by Camofrog at 9:10 AM on May 21, 2010