True Color: The Strange and Spectacular Quest to Define Color--from Azure to Zinc Pink

Kory Stamper

Mar 2026 · Sold by Knopf

About this ebook

A kaleidoscopic journey through the secret history of hues—and the story of the obsessive genius behind the definitions of colors we use today, from the beloved author of Word by Word

"Wildly entertaining and bountifully informative; I couldn't have enjoyed myself more." —Benjamin Dreyer, New York Times bestselling author of Dreyer's English


begonia (n.): 3 -s : a deep pink that is bluer, lighter, and stronger than average coral (see coral 3b), bluer than fiesta, and bluer and stronger than sweet william — called also gaiety

What could "bluer than fiesta" possibly mean? While editing dictionaries for Merriam-Webster, Kory Stamper found herself drawn again and again to the whimsical color definitions in Webster’s Third New International Dictionary—especially when compared to the dry and impersonal entries that filled the rest of the volume. Stamper couldn’t help but wonder: Who was the voice behind these peculiar definitions?

Meet I. H. Godlove, an erratic but brilliant up-and-coming scientist who was one of the experts Merriam-Webster hired in 1930 to help revise the dictionary to reflect a rapidly modernizing world. His fascinating life mirrors the wild and winding journey that color science, color psychology, and color production took through the twentieth century. Stamper tracks these industries as they move into the atomic age and intertwine in strange and surprising ways, spanning two world wars and involving chemical explosions, an unexpected suicide, dramatic office politics, and an extraordinary love story.

Filled with captivating facts about color words and colors themselves—did you know that the word “puke” used to refer to a fashionable shade of reddish-brown before it was associated with vomit?—and fueled by Stamper’s inexhaustible curiosity, True Color will transform the way you see the world, from black-and-white to Technicolor.

Ratings and reviews

Meet I. H. Godlove, the eccentric scientist behind the whimsical color definitions in Webster's Third New International Dictionary. His work reflected the evolution of color science through the 20th century, in a journey filled with chemical explosions, office politics, and an unexpected love story. This humorous, engaging, and easy-to-read book is packed with captivating facts about color. Thanks, NetGalley, for the ARC I received. This is my honest and voluntary review.

About the author

KORY STAMPER is a lexicographer who has written dictionaries for nearly thirty years at Merriam-Webster, Cambridge Dictionaries, and Dictionary.com. She is the author of Word by Word. Her writing has appeared in The Guardian, The New York Times, New York magazine, and The Washington Post, and she blogs regularly on language and lexicography at www.korystamper.com.