Pecuniary / pih-KYOO-nee-air-ee / adjective:
1. Relating to money; monetary.
2. Consisting of money.
3. Requiring payment of money.
He lacked the finer element of conscience which looks upon Art as a sacred calling, she remembered, and because of "pecuniary necessities" he "scattered his forces in many different and unworthy directions."
-- James F. O'Gorman, Accomplished in All Departments of Art
The young man of the house was absorbed in his vegetable garden and the possibilities for pecuniary profit that it held.
-- Samuel Chamberlain, Clementine in the Kitchen
He sees the great pecuniary rewards and how they are gained, and naturally is moved by an impulse to obtain the same for himself.
-- David J. Brewer, "The Ideal Lawyer", The Atlantic, November 1906
Over the decades, Pitt built an impressive roster of similarly well-heeled clients who stood accused by the SEC of securities fraud, misstating their finances, other pecuniary offenses.
-- Jonathan Chait, "Invested Interest", The New Republic, December 17, 2001
Showing posts with label Wednesday's word. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Wednesday's word. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Wednesday's Word
Verboten / ver-BOHT-n / adjective:
Forbidden, as by law; prohibited.
I'd observed several people taking photographs of these with their camera-phones, although a sign on a tripod just inside the door announced that all photography was verboten.
-- Stephen King, Duma Key: A Novel
Small assemblages by Hermann Glockner, for example, should come as a revelation even to Germans. Glockner, who died in 1987 at 98, concocted little sculptural gems in his studio, jus for himself: elegant Constructivist improvisations, talismans of verboten modernism, made by folding, twisting and tying together discarded matchboxes, cut-up soap containers, tin pots, wood blocks and newspaper.
-- Michael Kimmelman, "How art connected 2 sides of the Berlin Wall", New York Times, February 16, 2009
The girls eyed one another conspiratorially: the verboten pastry, stuffed with preservatives and refined sugar, offered without even the minutest of moral struggles; to what do we owe this great pleasure? "Yes!" said Daisy, running toward the house, not waiting for me to change my mind.
-- Deborah Copaken Kogan, Between Here and April
Forbidden, as by law; prohibited.
I'd observed several people taking photographs of these with their camera-phones, although a sign on a tripod just inside the door announced that all photography was verboten.
-- Stephen King, Duma Key: A Novel
Small assemblages by Hermann Glockner, for example, should come as a revelation even to Germans. Glockner, who died in 1987 at 98, concocted little sculptural gems in his studio, jus for himself: elegant Constructivist improvisations, talismans of verboten modernism, made by folding, twisting and tying together discarded matchboxes, cut-up soap containers, tin pots, wood blocks and newspaper.
-- Michael Kimmelman, "How art connected 2 sides of the Berlin Wall", New York Times, February 16, 2009
The girls eyed one another conspiratorially: the verboten pastry, stuffed with preservatives and refined sugar, offered without even the minutest of moral struggles; to what do we owe this great pleasure? "Yes!" said Daisy, running toward the house, not waiting for me to change my mind.
-- Deborah Copaken Kogan, Between Here and April
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Wednesday's Word
Lacuna / luh-KYOO-nuh / noun
plural lacunae / luh-KYOO-nee / or lacunas / Lacuna is from the Latin lacuna, "a cavity, a hollow," from lacus, "a hollow.":
1. A blank space; a missing part; a gap.
2. (Biology) A small opening, depression, or cavity in an anatomical structure.
Like most other writers of his generation, he was a profoundly apolitical being, not from any lacuna in his education but as a matter or principle.
-- Walter Laqueur, "The Artist in Politics", New York Times, May 15, 1983
Between the time of my first memory . . . and my second and third memories, I remember nothing. The lacunae of these years I've been able to fill sketchily from the entries in my baby book, which notes such incidents as my first smile.
-- Jaime Manrique, Eminent Maricones
The exodus of wives, relatives, friends and hangers-on had left a big howling lacuna which wrapped the homestead in webs of glorious nostalgia.
-- Moses Isegawa, Abyssinian Chronicles
plural lacunae / luh-KYOO-nee / or lacunas / Lacuna is from the Latin lacuna, "a cavity, a hollow," from lacus, "a hollow.":
1. A blank space; a missing part; a gap.
2. (Biology) A small opening, depression, or cavity in an anatomical structure.
Like most other writers of his generation, he was a profoundly apolitical being, not from any lacuna in his education but as a matter or principle.
-- Walter Laqueur, "The Artist in Politics", New York Times, May 15, 1983
Between the time of my first memory . . . and my second and third memories, I remember nothing. The lacunae of these years I've been able to fill sketchily from the entries in my baby book, which notes such incidents as my first smile.
-- Jaime Manrique, Eminent Maricones
The exodus of wives, relatives, friends and hangers-on had left a big howling lacuna which wrapped the homestead in webs of glorious nostalgia.
-- Moses Isegawa, Abyssinian Chronicles
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
Wednesday's Word
Lapidary / LAP-uh-dair-ee / adjective:
1. Of or pertaining to the art of cutting stones or engraving on them.
2. Engraved in stone.
3. Of or pertaining to the refined or terse style associated with inscriptions on monumental stone.
noun:
1. One who cuts, polishes, and engraves precious stones.
2. A dealer in precious stones.
Here, disguested by venality and intrigue, the retired courtier would come to compose lapidary maxims and wise but sympathetic letters to ardent youth.
-- Michael Foley, Getting Used to Not Being Remarkable
If I asked how long it took to simmer the meat sauce, Emilia would answer with a grumble and her usual lapidary phrase: "Quanto basta. As long as it takes."
-- Patrizia Chen, Rosemary and Bitter Oranges
The settings for Jim Crace's fiction are always evoked with superb, lapidary precision.
-- Caroline Moore, "The timid Don Juan", Sunday Telegraph, August 31, 2003
1. Of or pertaining to the art of cutting stones or engraving on them.
2. Engraved in stone.
3. Of or pertaining to the refined or terse style associated with inscriptions on monumental stone.
noun:
1. One who cuts, polishes, and engraves precious stones.
2. A dealer in precious stones.
Here, disguested by venality and intrigue, the retired courtier would come to compose lapidary maxims and wise but sympathetic letters to ardent youth.
-- Michael Foley, Getting Used to Not Being Remarkable
If I asked how long it took to simmer the meat sauce, Emilia would answer with a grumble and her usual lapidary phrase: "Quanto basta. As long as it takes."
-- Patrizia Chen, Rosemary and Bitter Oranges
The settings for Jim Crace's fiction are always evoked with superb, lapidary precision.
-- Caroline Moore, "The timid Don Juan", Sunday Telegraph, August 31, 2003
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
Wednesday's Word
Flibbertigibbet / FLIB-ur-tee-jib-it / noun:
A silly, flighty, or scatterbrained person, especially a pert young woman with such qualities.
We discovered here not the flibbertigibbet Connolly describes but a serious reader (Goethe, Tolstoy, Proust) who found her cultural ideal in the 18th-century France.
-- Martin Stannard, "Enter Shrieking", New York Times, November 28, 1993
He argues persuasively that Millay's reputation has been harmed not only by academics who dread and fear her heartfelt "simplicity," but by the very admirers who wished to promote her as a kind of whimsical flibbertigibbet, a peotical Anne of Green Gables.
-- Liz Rosenberg, "So Young, So Good, So Popular", New York Times, March 15, 1992
That it was the Owenses who had got involved in this nonsense, rather than some flibbertigibbet johnny-come-latelies, counted for a lot, for the Owenses were respectable and respected.
-- Neil Gaiman and Dave Mckean, The Graveyard Book
A silly, flighty, or scatterbrained person, especially a pert young woman with such qualities.
We discovered here not the flibbertigibbet Connolly describes but a serious reader (Goethe, Tolstoy, Proust) who found her cultural ideal in the 18th-century France.
-- Martin Stannard, "Enter Shrieking", New York Times, November 28, 1993
He argues persuasively that Millay's reputation has been harmed not only by academics who dread and fear her heartfelt "simplicity," but by the very admirers who wished to promote her as a kind of whimsical flibbertigibbet, a peotical Anne of Green Gables.
-- Liz Rosenberg, "So Young, So Good, So Popular", New York Times, March 15, 1992
That it was the Owenses who had got involved in this nonsense, rather than some flibbertigibbet johnny-come-latelies, counted for a lot, for the Owenses were respectable and respected.
-- Neil Gaiman and Dave Mckean, The Graveyard Book
Wednesday, December 30, 2009
Wednesday's Word
Presage / PRES-ij; pre-SEYJ / noun
1. An indication or warning of a future event; an omen.
2. A feeling or intuition of what the future holds.
3. Prophetic significance.
4. [Archaic] A prediction; a prognostication.
transitive verb:
1. To indicate or warn of beforehand; to foreshadow.
2. To have a presentiment of.
3. To predict; to foretell.
intransitive verb:
1. To make or utter a prediction.
Although the enlightenment and liberation which had been expected to come after the war had not come with victory, a presage of freedom was in the air throughout these post-war years, and it was their only historical meaning.
-- Boris Pasternak, Doctor Zhivago
Never before, perhaps, in the history of the world, was an hour so fateful, so full of presage, as the present. Big with starting possibilities, unfolding vistas of unimagined boldness and beauty, it speaks with a very trumpet-call of eternally recreative energy to us "upon whom the ends of the world are come."
-- Clara M. Codd, Looking Forward
It [the comet] had been there for some time, said Todd, "and for the Sherpas it presaged things not going terrible well." A superstition, yes, thought Todd, but a matter of serious concern, because the people who knew the mountain best said it mattered.
-- Anatoli Boukreev and G. Weston DeWalt, The Climb
Earlier in the day a supply teacher I had never seen before sat down a few chairs away with the happy ostentatious sigh that invariably presages an invasion of privacy.
-- Michael Foley, Getting Used to Not Being Remarkable
Warhol, a wigged-out psychic, had presaged the whole thing.
-- Phoebe Hoban, Basquiat
1. An indication or warning of a future event; an omen.
2. A feeling or intuition of what the future holds.
3. Prophetic significance.
4. [Archaic] A prediction; a prognostication.
transitive verb:
1. To indicate or warn of beforehand; to foreshadow.
2. To have a presentiment of.
3. To predict; to foretell.
intransitive verb:
1. To make or utter a prediction.
Although the enlightenment and liberation which had been expected to come after the war had not come with victory, a presage of freedom was in the air throughout these post-war years, and it was their only historical meaning.
-- Boris Pasternak, Doctor Zhivago
Never before, perhaps, in the history of the world, was an hour so fateful, so full of presage, as the present. Big with starting possibilities, unfolding vistas of unimagined boldness and beauty, it speaks with a very trumpet-call of eternally recreative energy to us "upon whom the ends of the world are come."
-- Clara M. Codd, Looking Forward
It [the comet] had been there for some time, said Todd, "and for the Sherpas it presaged things not going terrible well." A superstition, yes, thought Todd, but a matter of serious concern, because the people who knew the mountain best said it mattered.
-- Anatoli Boukreev and G. Weston DeWalt, The Climb
Earlier in the day a supply teacher I had never seen before sat down a few chairs away with the happy ostentatious sigh that invariably presages an invasion of privacy.
-- Michael Foley, Getting Used to Not Being Remarkable
Warhol, a wigged-out psychic, had presaged the whole thing.
-- Phoebe Hoban, Basquiat
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
Wednesday's Word
Clinquant / KLING-kunt / adjective
1. Glittering with gold or silver; tinseled.
noun:
1. Tinsel; imitation gold leaf.
Leaves flicker celadon in the spring, viridian in summer, clinquant in fall, tallying the sovereign seasons, graying and greening to reiterate the message of snow and sun.
-- Ann Zwinger, Beyond the Aspen Grove
The room had a twelve-foot high ceiling: hanging from it, four dimly lit antique brass chandeliers cast a clinquant glow on this sunless day.
-- Sally Koslow, The Late, Lamented Molly Marx: A Novel
The water, turned clinquant by the sunset, lay rather than stood.
-- William Least Heat-Moon, River-Horse: The Logbook of a Boat Across America
1. Glittering with gold or silver; tinseled.
noun:
1. Tinsel; imitation gold leaf.
Leaves flicker celadon in the spring, viridian in summer, clinquant in fall, tallying the sovereign seasons, graying and greening to reiterate the message of snow and sun.
-- Ann Zwinger, Beyond the Aspen Grove
The room had a twelve-foot high ceiling: hanging from it, four dimly lit antique brass chandeliers cast a clinquant glow on this sunless day.
-- Sally Koslow, The Late, Lamented Molly Marx: A Novel
The water, turned clinquant by the sunset, lay rather than stood.
-- William Least Heat-Moon, River-Horse: The Logbook of a Boat Across America
Thursday, December 17, 2009
Wednesday's Word
Doff / DOF / transitive verb
1. To take off, as an article of clothing
2. To tip or remove (one's hat).
3. To put aside; to rid oneself of.
After I finished sweeping, I grabbed my check, went to the locker room, and doffed the monkey suit, slipped into my jeans, sneakers and T-shirt and broke camp.
-- Reginald McKnight, White Boys: Stories
Any moment now and Max Linder would ride out from around the corner on a pair of white horses, fire blanks at a passing beauty, and doff his top hat to hide his face from the policeman.
-- Nina Berberova, The Book of Happiness
Benny doffed his cap grandly.
-- Thomas Maier, Dr. Spock: An American Life
And he became as a pillar of fire to superannuated peoples who had but to doff the lethargy of custom to find themselves young.
-- J. F. A. Pyre, "Byron in Our Day", The Atlantic, April 1907
1. To take off, as an article of clothing
2. To tip or remove (one's hat).
3. To put aside; to rid oneself of.
After I finished sweeping, I grabbed my check, went to the locker room, and doffed the monkey suit, slipped into my jeans, sneakers and T-shirt and broke camp.
-- Reginald McKnight, White Boys: Stories
Any moment now and Max Linder would ride out from around the corner on a pair of white horses, fire blanks at a passing beauty, and doff his top hat to hide his face from the policeman.
-- Nina Berberova, The Book of Happiness
Benny doffed his cap grandly.
-- Thomas Maier, Dr. Spock: An American Life
And he became as a pillar of fire to superannuated peoples who had but to doff the lethargy of custom to find themselves young.
-- J. F. A. Pyre, "Byron in Our Day", The Atlantic, April 1907
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Wednesday's Word
Provender / PROV-uhn-duhr / noun
1. Dry food for domestic animals, such as hay, straw, corn, oats, or a mixture of ground grain; feed.
2. Food or provisions.
It turns out that he and thousands of other German immigrants have been acting as pre-invasion intelligence-gatherers, ensuring that "the German Army knew almost to a bale of hay what provender lay between London and the coast."
-- Niall Ferguson, The Pity of War
Frances Trollope, Captain Marryat, Colonel Basil Hall and Charles Dickens in 1842 all commented on the way Americans wolfed down their provender as fast as possible, cramming the cornbread in their sloppy maws and, worse, doing so in grim silence, punctuated only by noise of slurps, grunts; scraping knives and hacking coughs.
-- Simon Schama, "Them and US", The Guardian, March 29, 2003
1. Dry food for domestic animals, such as hay, straw, corn, oats, or a mixture of ground grain; feed.
2. Food or provisions.
It turns out that he and thousands of other German immigrants have been acting as pre-invasion intelligence-gatherers, ensuring that "the German Army knew almost to a bale of hay what provender lay between London and the coast."
-- Niall Ferguson, The Pity of War
Frances Trollope, Captain Marryat, Colonel Basil Hall and Charles Dickens in 1842 all commented on the way Americans wolfed down their provender as fast as possible, cramming the cornbread in their sloppy maws and, worse, doing so in grim silence, punctuated only by noise of slurps, grunts; scraping knives and hacking coughs.
-- Simon Schama, "Them and US", The Guardian, March 29, 2003
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Wednesday's Word
Exegesis / ek-suh-JEE-sis / noun
plural exegeses / -seez /
Exposition; explanation; especially, a critical explanation of a text.
It is a fiercely argued exegesis of Shakespeare's plays in the tradition of Samuel Johnson, Hazlitt and A. C. Bradley, a study that is as passionate as it is erudite.
-- Michiko Kakutani, "Vast Shakespearean Drama With All People as Players", New York Times, October 27, 1998
These are tightly argued, crisp exercises in literary and cultural exegesis which make perfectly clear the brilliant patterns of language and oftentimes strained analogic thinking of the poets.
-- review of Made in America, by Lisa M. Steinman, in the Journal of Modern Literature
No variety of love is too trivial for exegesis. No aspect of love is so ridiculous that it hasn't been exhaustively reviewed by the great thinkers, the great artists, and the great hosts of daytime talk shows.
-- P. J. O'Rourke, Eat the Rich
Their works are the subject of innumerable analyses, exegeses, seminars, and doctoral theses.
-- Alan Sokal and Jean Bricmont, Fashionable Nonsense
plural exegeses / -seez /
Exposition; explanation; especially, a critical explanation of a text.
It is a fiercely argued exegesis of Shakespeare's plays in the tradition of Samuel Johnson, Hazlitt and A. C. Bradley, a study that is as passionate as it is erudite.
-- Michiko Kakutani, "Vast Shakespearean Drama With All People as Players", New York Times, October 27, 1998
These are tightly argued, crisp exercises in literary and cultural exegesis which make perfectly clear the brilliant patterns of language and oftentimes strained analogic thinking of the poets.
-- review of Made in America, by Lisa M. Steinman, in the Journal of Modern Literature
No variety of love is too trivial for exegesis. No aspect of love is so ridiculous that it hasn't been exhaustively reviewed by the great thinkers, the great artists, and the great hosts of daytime talk shows.
-- P. J. O'Rourke, Eat the Rich
Their works are the subject of innumerable analyses, exegeses, seminars, and doctoral theses.
-- Alan Sokal and Jean Bricmont, Fashionable Nonsense
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
Wednesday's Word
Forfend / for-FEND / transitive verb
also forefend
1. a. (Archaic) To prohibit; to forbid.
b. To ward off; to prevent; to avert.
2. To defend; to protect; to preserve.
The Tory leader sort of wanted to say that the government should deploy the army more rapidly, but -- heaven forfend -- he didn't want to imply that it was anybody's fault that the soldiers hadn't been deployed!
-- Simon Hoggart, "A greasy whiff dispels the stench of worthiness", Guardian, March 22, 2001
If one of us is missing, heaven forfend, then the king's forces are diminished.
-- Leon Wieseltier, Kaddish
The river of discovery will continue to flow without cessation, deepening our understanding of the world and enhancing our capacity to forfend calamity and live congenial lives.
-- John Maddox, What Remains To Be Discovered
also forefend
1. a. (Archaic) To prohibit; to forbid.
b. To ward off; to prevent; to avert.
2. To defend; to protect; to preserve.
The Tory leader sort of wanted to say that the government should deploy the army more rapidly, but -- heaven forfend -- he didn't want to imply that it was anybody's fault that the soldiers hadn't been deployed!
-- Simon Hoggart, "A greasy whiff dispels the stench of worthiness", Guardian, March 22, 2001
If one of us is missing, heaven forfend, then the king's forces are diminished.
-- Leon Wieseltier, Kaddish
The river of discovery will continue to flow without cessation, deepening our understanding of the world and enhancing our capacity to forfend calamity and live congenial lives.
-- John Maddox, What Remains To Be Discovered
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
Wednesday's Word
Skulduggery / skul-DUG-uh-ree / noun
also skullduggery
Devious, dishonest, or unscrupulous behavior or activity; also: an instance thereof.
And then the inquests, and the coroner's reports, and the hints of diplomatic cover-ups, and skulduggery in high places.
-- Hilary Mantel, Eight Months on Ghazzah Street
Laptop theft was the third most common electonic skulduggery, behind viruses (84 percent) and unauthorized employee use of computers and software (78 percent), according to the survery by the Computer Security Institute in San Francisco.
-- Michael Cooper, "Low Tech Joins the Fights Against High-Tech Theft", New York Times, April 23, 1998
For instance, the Federal Trade Commission already goes after some kindsof Internet skulduggery, like selling products that promise more than they deliver.
-- David Stout, "New Internet Anti-Fraud Center Announced by Attorney General", New York Times, May 9, 2000
also skullduggery
Devious, dishonest, or unscrupulous behavior or activity; also: an instance thereof.
And then the inquests, and the coroner's reports, and the hints of diplomatic cover-ups, and skulduggery in high places.
-- Hilary Mantel, Eight Months on Ghazzah Street
Laptop theft was the third most common electonic skulduggery, behind viruses (84 percent) and unauthorized employee use of computers and software (78 percent), according to the survery by the Computer Security Institute in San Francisco.
-- Michael Cooper, "Low Tech Joins the Fights Against High-Tech Theft", New York Times, April 23, 1998
For instance, the Federal Trade Commission already goes after some kindsof Internet skulduggery, like selling products that promise more than they deliver.
-- David Stout, "New Internet Anti-Fraud Center Announced by Attorney General", New York Times, May 9, 2000
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Wednesday's Word
Conflate / Kuhn-FLAYT / transitive verb
1. To bring together; to fuse together; to join or meld.
2. To combine (as two readings of a text) into one whole.
Scott Reynolds's creepy debut feature [film] conflates the present and the past with ingenious use of flashbacks.
-- Anne Billson, "Bent beneath the weight of its own righteousness", Sunday Telegraph, March 1, 1998
Painting America as a drug-ridden society leads to bad policy -- as does the tendency in some quarters to conflate the various drug abuses into a single dreadful statistic.
-- William Raspberry, "Not a Drug-Ridden Society", Washington Post, April 21, 2000
. . .lean and mobile military units that conflate the traditional categories of police officers, commandos, emergency-relief specialists, diplomats, and, of course, intelligence officers.
-- Robert D. Kaplan, "The roles of the CIA and the military may merge", The Atlantic, February 1998
1. To bring together; to fuse together; to join or meld.
2. To combine (as two readings of a text) into one whole.
Scott Reynolds's creepy debut feature [film] conflates the present and the past with ingenious use of flashbacks.
-- Anne Billson, "Bent beneath the weight of its own righteousness", Sunday Telegraph, March 1, 1998
Painting America as a drug-ridden society leads to bad policy -- as does the tendency in some quarters to conflate the various drug abuses into a single dreadful statistic.
-- William Raspberry, "Not a Drug-Ridden Society", Washington Post, April 21, 2000
. . .lean and mobile military units that conflate the traditional categories of police officers, commandos, emergency-relief specialists, diplomats, and, of course, intelligence officers.
-- Robert D. Kaplan, "The roles of the CIA and the military may merge", The Atlantic, February 1998
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Wednesday's Word
Aesthete / ES-theet / noun
One having or affecting great sensitivity to beauty, as in art or nature.
Beijing, with its stolid, square buildings and wide, straight roads, feels like the plan of a first-year engineering student, while Shanghai's decorative architecture and snaking, narrow roads feel like the plan of an aesthete.
-- "Sky's the Limit in Shanghai", Los Angeles Times, April 25, 1999
But he was also an aesthete with a connoisseur's eye for the wild modernist innovations with letterforms and layout of the 1920s.
--Rick Poynor, "Herbert Spencer", The Guardian, March 15, 2002
Where the standard Oxford aesthete of the 1920s had been slowily dissipated, full of wild talk about decadence and beauty, Auden was preaching a new gospel of icy austerity and self-control.
-- Ian Hamilton, Against Oblivion
One having or affecting great sensitivity to beauty, as in art or nature.
Beijing, with its stolid, square buildings and wide, straight roads, feels like the plan of a first-year engineering student, while Shanghai's decorative architecture and snaking, narrow roads feel like the plan of an aesthete.
-- "Sky's the Limit in Shanghai", Los Angeles Times, April 25, 1999
But he was also an aesthete with a connoisseur's eye for the wild modernist innovations with letterforms and layout of the 1920s.
--Rick Poynor, "Herbert Spencer", The Guardian, March 15, 2002
Where the standard Oxford aesthete of the 1920s had been slowily dissipated, full of wild talk about decadence and beauty, Auden was preaching a new gospel of icy austerity and self-control.
-- Ian Hamilton, Against Oblivion
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Wednesday's Word
Pukka / PUHK-uh / adjective
1. Authentic; genuine
2. Superior; first-class
He talks like the quintessential pukka Englishman and quotes Chesterton and Kipling by the yard and yet he has chosen to live most of his adult life abroad.
-- Lynn Barber, "Bell book . . . and then what?" The Observer, August 27, 2000
If he does not have a house, the government gives him a pukka residence, not a . . . shack on the pavement but a solid construction.
-- Salman Rushdie, The Ground Beneath Her Feet
1. Authentic; genuine
2. Superior; first-class
He talks like the quintessential pukka Englishman and quotes Chesterton and Kipling by the yard and yet he has chosen to live most of his adult life abroad.
-- Lynn Barber, "Bell book . . . and then what?" The Observer, August 27, 2000
If he does not have a house, the government gives him a pukka residence, not a . . . shack on the pavement but a solid construction.
-- Salman Rushdie, The Ground Beneath Her Feet
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
Wednesday's Word
Foofaraw / FOO-fuh-raw / noun
1. Excessive or flashy ornamentation or decoration.
2. A fuss over a matter of little importance.
A somber, muted descending motif opens and closes the work, which is brief but effective. It provided much needed relief from the fanfares and foofaraw in which brass-going composers so often indulge.
-- Philip Kennicott, "Brass Spectacular is a Spectacle of Special Sound", St. Louis Post-Dispatch, January 17, 1997
As usual, with all cooperation with Tom Lea, Art becomes a "taking away" process rather than the adding of ornaments, rules, and other foofaraw.
-- David R. Farmer, Calgary Sun
Making the Times best-seller list, or a movie, or all that other foofaraw is not necessarily proof of [a novel's] lasting significance.
-- Roger K. Miller, "Peyton Place' was remarkably good bad novel", Minneapolis Star Tribune, December 29, 1996.
1. Excessive or flashy ornamentation or decoration.
2. A fuss over a matter of little importance.
A somber, muted descending motif opens and closes the work, which is brief but effective. It provided much needed relief from the fanfares and foofaraw in which brass-going composers so often indulge.
-- Philip Kennicott, "Brass Spectacular is a Spectacle of Special Sound", St. Louis Post-Dispatch, January 17, 1997
As usual, with all cooperation with Tom Lea, Art becomes a "taking away" process rather than the adding of ornaments, rules, and other foofaraw.
-- David R. Farmer, Calgary Sun
Making the Times best-seller list, or a movie, or all that other foofaraw is not necessarily proof of [a novel's] lasting significance.
-- Roger K. Miller, "Peyton Place' was remarkably good bad novel", Minneapolis Star Tribune, December 29, 1996.
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Wednesday's Word
Gaucherie / goh-shuh-REE / noun
1. A socially awkward or tactless act.
2. Lack of tact; boorishness; awkwardness.
If you find yourself sitting next to an obviously prosperous guest at a dinner party and your host introduces him (it will be a him) as a "successful barrister", you will be guilty of a gaucherie of the crassest kind if you exclaim: "How fascinating! If I promise not to call you Rumpole, will you tell me about your goriest murder trials?"
-- Nick Cohen, "Don't leave justice to the judges", New Statesmen, December 13, 1999
Here we see the insecure, unattractive woman who at long last has found someone even more insecure and unattractive than herself, calling attention to her companion's gaucherie in order to feel, for once in her life, like the belle of the ball.
-- Florence King, "Out and About", National Review, November 9, 1998
1. A socially awkward or tactless act.
2. Lack of tact; boorishness; awkwardness.
If you find yourself sitting next to an obviously prosperous guest at a dinner party and your host introduces him (it will be a him) as a "successful barrister", you will be guilty of a gaucherie of the crassest kind if you exclaim: "How fascinating! If I promise not to call you Rumpole, will you tell me about your goriest murder trials?"
-- Nick Cohen, "Don't leave justice to the judges", New Statesmen, December 13, 1999
Here we see the insecure, unattractive woman who at long last has found someone even more insecure and unattractive than herself, calling attention to her companion's gaucherie in order to feel, for once in her life, like the belle of the ball.
-- Florence King, "Out and About", National Review, November 9, 1998
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Wednesday's Word
Eldritch / EL-drich / adjective
Strange; unearthly; weird; eerie.
In the eldritch light of evening in Nevada's Black Rock Desert, the eye plays tricks on the brain.
-- Thom Stark, "Something's Burning", Boardwatch, November 2000
The immitigable mountains and their stark, eldritch trees; coasts where earth abruptly snapped off, never to be continued, or beaches which gnawed it to bright dust and sucked it gently away. . .
-- Carolyn Kizer, "A Childhood South of Nowhere", New York Times, April 9, 1989
Strange; unearthly; weird; eerie.
In the eldritch light of evening in Nevada's Black Rock Desert, the eye plays tricks on the brain.
-- Thom Stark, "Something's Burning", Boardwatch, November 2000
The immitigable mountains and their stark, eldritch trees; coasts where earth abruptly snapped off, never to be continued, or beaches which gnawed it to bright dust and sucked it gently away. . .
-- Carolyn Kizer, "A Childhood South of Nowhere", New York Times, April 9, 1989
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Wednesday's Word
Logorrhea / law-guh-REE-uh / noun
1. Pathologically incoherent, repetitious speech.
2. Incessant or compulsive talkativeness; wearisome volubility.
By his own measure, he is a man of many contradictions, beginning with the fact that he is famous as a listener but suffers from "a touch of logorrhea." He is so voluble that one wonders how his subjects get a word in edgewise.
-- Mel Gussow, "Listener, Talker, Now Literary Lion: It's Official.", New York Times, June 17, 1997
It's also not good if your date has logorrhea.
-- Monte Williams, "8 Minutes in the Life of a Jewish Single: Not Attracted? Next!", New York Times, March 5, 2000
Mr. King, who possesses an enviable superabundance of imagination, suffers from a less enviable logorrhea.
-- Michele Slung, "Scare Tactics.", New York Times, May 10, 1981
1. Pathologically incoherent, repetitious speech.
2. Incessant or compulsive talkativeness; wearisome volubility.
By his own measure, he is a man of many contradictions, beginning with the fact that he is famous as a listener but suffers from "a touch of logorrhea." He is so voluble that one wonders how his subjects get a word in edgewise.
-- Mel Gussow, "Listener, Talker, Now Literary Lion: It's Official.", New York Times, June 17, 1997
It's also not good if your date has logorrhea.
-- Monte Williams, "8 Minutes in the Life of a Jewish Single: Not Attracted? Next!", New York Times, March 5, 2000
Mr. King, who possesses an enviable superabundance of imagination, suffers from a less enviable logorrhea.
-- Michele Slung, "Scare Tactics.", New York Times, May 10, 1981
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
Wednesday's Word
Malapropism / mal-uh-PROP-iz-uhm / noun
1. An act or habit of misusing words ridiculously, esp. by the confusion of words that are similar in sound.
2. An example of such misuse.
At 15, Rachel, the whiny would-be beauty queen who "cares for naught but appearances," can think only of what she misses: the five-day deodorant pads she forgot to bring, flush toilets, maching-washed clothes and other things, as she says with her willful gift for malapropism, that she has taken "for granite."
-- Michiko Kakutani, "The Poisonwood Bible': A Family a Heart of Darkness", New York Times, October 16, 1998
He also had, as a former colleague puts it, "a photogenic memory"--a malapropism that captures his gift for the social side of life, his Clintonian ability to remember names of countless people he has met only briefly.
-- Eric Pooley and S.C. Gwynne, "How George Got His Groove", Time, June 21, 1999
Its success may be unusual, but brunt force is hardly the only malapropism pushing its way into our lexicon.
-- Jan Freeman, "CYCLING; Crashes Jolt the Standings, And Oust a Tour Favorite", Boston Globe, April 13, 2008
1. An act or habit of misusing words ridiculously, esp. by the confusion of words that are similar in sound.
2. An example of such misuse.
At 15, Rachel, the whiny would-be beauty queen who "cares for naught but appearances," can think only of what she misses: the five-day deodorant pads she forgot to bring, flush toilets, maching-washed clothes and other things, as she says with her willful gift for malapropism, that she has taken "for granite."
-- Michiko Kakutani, "The Poisonwood Bible': A Family a Heart of Darkness", New York Times, October 16, 1998
He also had, as a former colleague puts it, "a photogenic memory"--a malapropism that captures his gift for the social side of life, his Clintonian ability to remember names of countless people he has met only briefly.
-- Eric Pooley and S.C. Gwynne, "How George Got His Groove", Time, June 21, 1999
Its success may be unusual, but brunt force is hardly the only malapropism pushing its way into our lexicon.
-- Jan Freeman, "CYCLING; Crashes Jolt the Standings, And Oust a Tour Favorite", Boston Globe, April 13, 2008
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