In next week’s column, “What do you mean by that?” I ask the perennial question:
Big words – what are they good for?
One man who has some very good answers to that question is
writer James S. Murphy, who offers them in “The
case for SAT words,” published on-line on Dec. 11, 2013 at The Atlantic
site.
I cited several big words I encountered while reading Edmund
Crispin’s 1948 detective novel Love Lies Bleeding, and promised definitions.
Infusoria – the host of microscopic creatures such as ciliates, euglenoids, protozoa,
unicellular algae and small invertebrates one finds in freshwater ponds.
harmattan — a hot, dry and dusty wind blowing over West Africa from
the Sahara Desert from late November until mid-March
vintem — a
Portuguese coin first issued in the late 15th century
cryptogamic — of one of the plant species that reproduce
by spores
congener — a thing or person of the same kind or category as another
eremitical — hermit-like or reclusive
ferial – denotes
a weekday in the Catholic or Anglican liturgical calendar that is not devoted
to a festival or fast
irrefragable
— impossible to
refute, according to some
dictionaries, but then that would call for irrefutable. Its origins suggest irrefragable is better
used to describe not that which cannot be refuted, but that which oughtn’t to
be refuted, as a church might consider its doctrines
Speaking of Edmund Crispin, I read his book on
the recommendation of English popular novelist Christopher Fowler, who enjoys a
good big word after dinner as much as the next man. Noting that the Times of London – now
in the bloody clutches of Rupert Murdoch – referred to one of the Kardashians
as ‘lavishly-arsed.” “Now, the correct word for this is, as many of us know, is
‘steatopygous,’” chided Fowler, tongue in cheek, “and the Times has missed an
opportunity to improve the wordpower of its readers by using it.”
This article appears in Aug 21-27, 2014.
