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Words I looked up recently
Jul. 3rd, 2010 11:35 pm...while reading The City & The City:
...while reading Chronic City:
...while reading Shop Class as Soulcraft:
A lot of people tell me they figure out unknown words by context and don't look them up. I guess sometimes that works, but other times you run across characters involved in "their nostalgic samizdat", which in context I could only possibly have guessed as "collage" or maybe "argument". Way, way off the mark.
- Polysemic: having multiple meanings.
- Doyen: A commander in charge of ten men; The senior, or eldest male member of a group; exemplar of a particular practice or movement. Can be "doyenne" if female; related to the word "dean".
- Machicolation: On castle walls, an overhanging parapet with a hole in the floor through which molten lead or missiles could be dropped. (This was possibly used incorrectly in the book; it was a sentence where "crenellation" would have worked perfectly.)
- boscage: a mass of trees or shrubs; a thicket.
...while reading Chronic City:
- samizdat: clandestine printing and distribution of dissident or banned literature; underground or illegal literature.
- bête noire: literally "black beast", someone or something that is disliked or avoided; an anathema.
- grotty ocelot loaf: just kidding, I didn't look this up, but Lethem gets major points for using this phrase on page 410 in a way that makes perfect sense. Now that's writing!
...while reading Shop Class as Soulcraft:
- modus vivendi: signifying an agreement between those whose opinions differ, such that they agree to disagree (used deliciously in the book, as a teenage mechanic "approaches a modus vivendi" with a cranky old VW Beetle).
- exegesis: A detailed analysis or interpretation of a work of literature, especially of the Bible. I'm sure I've looked this one up before.
- alloplastic: Referring to adaptation by means of altering the external environment. This can be contrasted to autoplastic, which refers to the alteration of one's own behavior and responses. Alloplastic also refers to artificial materials substituted for tissue grafts, in surgery.
A lot of people tell me they figure out unknown words by context and don't look them up. I guess sometimes that works, but other times you run across characters involved in "their nostalgic samizdat", which in context I could only possibly have guessed as "collage" or maybe "argument". Way, way off the mark.
