The word fall in English, both as a verb and a noun, has numerous meanings. People can fall, but so can stocks, water levels, and empires. As a noun fall can refer to the season Fall, the fall of a city, and the Fall of Man. Leaving aside the many ways in which inanimate objects … Read more
Sift means to separate the fine part of a substance with a sieve. It can also be used figuratively, where it means to examine something closely. As he talked, his wife, Setsuko, squatted in the ruin of the house. A small woman, she had a smudge of soot on her face as she carefully poked … Read more
Puleen Patel wonders about the appropriateness of hey as a greeting: I see most people online and offline address each other more and more by saying “Hey David” and so on. Is this correct? Is this a new thing? I always remembered addressing (and being addressed) as “Hi David” or “Hi Puleen”. When I was … Read more
People have been writing letters for centuries. Before the telephone and the Internet, sending a letter (by messenger, and later by post) was the only way to communicate with someone who was geographically distant. Even with all our modern technology, letters haven’t become obsolete. Most of us will write many letters during our business life: … Read more
inure: To bring (a person, etc.) by use, habit, or continual exercise to a certain condition or state of mind, to the endurance of a certain condition For example: Emergency room personnel become inured to the sight of blood. Scientists working in Antarctica become inured to the cold. Teachers in schools with weak principals become … Read more
Sublimate, in chemistry, means to purify a substance or to transform a compound from solid to gas state (without passing through the liquid one). In psychology, on the other hand, it means to direct a sexual impulse to a more accepted social activity (e.g., art or sports), thus calming the sexual impulse. For Mailer, incest … Read more
Maya Gharpure wants to know What does the term lilylivered mean? A lily-livered person is a coward, easily frightened. The term lily-livered is one of many vivid expressions we get from Shakespeare. It may not have originated with him, but his use of the term in the much-performed Macbeth ensured it a place in the … Read more
Indulge means to yield to a desire, to be permissive. The adjective is indulgent. The expression self-indulgent is often used to describe a person who is indulgent with her own desires. Francis must sublimate his passion for forces and fulcrums while he is playing; he would be pummeled, on the mound or otherwise. But in … Read more
Someone who puts their “best foot forward” must, logically, have three or more feet. Although this is a very common phrase (the title of a 1943 Lucille Ball film, for example) it is, at least for humans, grammatically incorrect. “Best” is the superlative form of the adjective “good” and superlatives are used to refer to … Read more
After reading the sobeit/so be it article, Shirley in Berkeley has this to say: Sobeit sounds like legal-speak to me. Working as a temp for a lawyer, I asked about their dropping the “e” from “therefore” and was told that it was legal usage: “therefor” meant “for that,” and with an “e” on the end, … Read more
I recently noticed this use of the word reign: After Chretien resigned as Prime Minister, we learned of a new major scandal that occurred during his reign. It surprised me because I attach the word reign to a royal personage, not an elected official. For example, El Greco to Velázquez: Art during the Reign of … Read more
Standstill is a state of rest or the cessation of a certain activity. The word originated from the stand still phrase. The announcement of a debt standstill on November 25th by Dubai World, a conglomerate based in the desert emirate, was almost as effective in catching investors unaware. (The Economist) A general strike called by … Read more