Visually striking but dramatically pedestrian for much of its length, this adaptation of Pip Williams’ bestseller unfolds with the steady thoroughness of a documentary.

The Dictionary of Lost Words. Photo © Daniel Boud

For those who don’t know the book, the story’s focus is Esme (played here by Tilda Cobham-Hervey), whom we meet aged four, playing at the feet of her father, one of a team of lexicographers working for Sir James Murray, editor of one of the greatest literary projects of the Victorian era, the Oxford English Dictionary.

She’s been raised in a world of words, but Esme’s attention is most piqued by the ephemera of Murray’s mission – discarded slips of paper carrying words deemed unfit for the OED: the slang of working-class folk; ancient and newfangled vulgarities and “women’s words”.

As she grows up, Esme builds a secret lexicon she keeps in a trunk. Years pass, life happens, loves comes and go, but Esme – who becomes a valued colleague in Murray’s “scriptorium” and an expert in words – stays true to a mission that won’t be recognised in her own lifetime.