The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography is a work which makes superlatives superfluous. Running 11 feet along the shelf and weighing in at a healthy defensive end's 280 pounds, the D.N.B.'s 60 volumes contain 60,000 pages and some 60 million words. More than 10,000 contributors have written a total of 54,922 essays on the worthies (as well as the worthless) who make up the fabric of British history. It has been more than 12 years in the making. NY Times