Words I have yet to hear from the Slate Culture Gabfest and Slate Political Gabfest, but which I expect to hear any day now. Some taken from my list of Annoying & Pretentious Terms. I’ll keep an updated list on the main page.
- alarum
- antinomy
- apparatchik
- atavistic
- august (as in old)
- ballyhooed; much-ballyhooed; long-ballyhooed
- beyond cavil
- bids fair
- brisance
- bucolic
- chowder
- clapboard
- cohort
- cordite
- doppelganger
- ennui
- ersatz
- familiar (noun: as in, companion, or member of household of a high official)
- frenetic
- fillip
- frisson
- halcyon
- hangdog
- high dudgeon
- hirsute
- insouciant
- jejune
- laconic
- let slip the dogs of war
- man of letters
- manque
- nod
- pleonasm
- repast
- resplendant
- sabre-rattling
- sanguine
- scintilla
- shuffle off this mortal coil
- slake
- splenetic
- stolid
- sue for peace
- terra firma
- turgid
- unawares
- vainglory
- vaunted or much-vaunted
- vouchsafe
- wag
- wainscoting
- well-nigh
- worry a bone
- writ large
Related posts:
- Interesting and Esoteric Words of the Slate Podcast Literati: Jan. 20-22, 2010
- Interesting and Esoteric Words of the Slate Podcast Literati: Jan. 27-29, 2010
- Interesting and Esoteric Words of the Slate Podcast Literati: Apr. 14, 2010
- Interesting and Esoteric Words of the Slate Podcast Literati: Apr. 28, 2010
- Interesting and Esoteric Words of the Slate Podcast Literati: May 5 & 12, 2010
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{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
dude many of those, including “ennui”, are used routinely by our favorite self-aware peeps
“pretentious doesn’t exist, and if it did you wouldn’t want the alternative” – F. Hayek
A few of these I use regularly, of course. I’m always on the wrong side of your lists!
But, remember, “pleonasm” is a figure of speech, and is no more to be despised than hyperbole, polysyndeton, or noema. They mean something, something specific. They are often the best words for the job.
They wouldn’t seem so obscure or “pretentious” if, in America, we had better educations, and more people read Quintilian.
One of the funniest things I’ve ever read. I stopped reading it and left the restaurant because I was laughing so hard.