If you can define "logophilia" without the aid of a dictionary, then you are probably a lover of words. One of the cardinal rules of writing is "Don't use big words when small ones will do." But who can resist words like: perspicacity, lugubrious, pontificate, verisimilitude and the like? There is joy in letting such words roll off your tongue, and a guilty pleasure in the bewildered stares that often follow.
The exercise for today is to use your favorite scholarly word (or words) in a sentence (or sentences) in the comment section. Don't give us a definition though. Let us try to work it out from the context.
My current new favorite:
"...complaints of anonymous letters...all of which, through the perspicacity of the Police, turned out to have been written by himself to himself for the purpose of attracting notoriety."
Of course, I can't get away with using words like perspicacity without sounding precocious. That was Kipling.
So, what are your favorites?
Thursday, March 11, 2010
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Oh, you are trying to make my laundry pile up. I am a hopeless logophile, but my brain feels like mush this morning. How do you like that big word, "mush" (straight from Goodnight Moon)?
ReplyDeleteNice dodge, MC, but you are not fooling me.
ReplyDeleteWell, I wouldn't want to be a dunderhead, or appear as a ninnyhammer by not contributing anything, but I cannot think of a single sentence this early in the morning that would not make me sound jejune.
Sorry.
Actually, my favorite is bloviate, which I use frequently. Thank, Mr. O'Reilly :-)
I'm sorry, but using big words just makes you sound supercilious.
ReplyDeleteWhat SHH may call a dodge is not prevarication;
ReplyDeleteIt merely is a symptom prolonged sleep deprivation.
She has been known to add a perspicacious observation;
But, on this point, you must accept my own elucidation.
What she said . . .
ReplyDeleteI should confess that "stuff, thingy and goo" are the two most commonly used words in our household. Scholarly words are fun, but not the norm.
ReplyDeleteWhy do I think that MC posted that Anonymous comment? Just a skeptic, I suppose... :-)
ReplyDeleteIt was an accident, I tell ya! Didn't mean to post incognito. ;-)
ReplyDeleteI left out a word in my little poem . . . dommage! Here it is with emendation:
ReplyDeleteWhat SHH may call a dodge is not prevarication;
It merely is a symptom of prolonged sleep deprivation.
She has been known to add a perspicacious observation;
But, on this point, you must accept my own elucidation.
Hmmph.
ReplyDelete"Hmmph" . . . now there's some eloquence dug out of the ruminations archive!
ReplyDelete