New/Old Words
Listed here are forgotten and newly acquired words discovered while reading A Part of Myself
We are reading A Part of Myself in celebration of Carl Zuckmayer's birthday: December 27, 1896. "One-half of life is luck; the other half is discipline - and that's the important half, for without discipline you wouldn't know what to do with luck." Des Teufels General: Ernst Udet and Carl Zuckmayer
SCRIM: (in a theater) a piece of gauze cloth that appears opaque until lit from behind, used as a screen or backdrop.
ReplyDeleteOBDURATE: stubbornly refusing to change one's opinion or course of action.
ReplyDeletePROSCENIUM ARCH: A proscenium arch describes the frame that surrounds a stage space, separating the audience from the stage. This helps to create a fourth wall , which is particularly appropriate for naturalistic productions.
ReplyDeleteSOMNAMBULIST: A person who walks about in his or her sleep; a sleepwalker.
ReplyDeleteCREPUSCULAR: of, resembling, or relating to twilight.
ReplyDeleteRUSTICATION : to go into or reside in the country : follow a rustic life
ReplyDeletePLEBISCITE: the direct vote of all the members of an electorate on an important public question such as a change in the constitution.
ReplyDeleteOBSEQUIES: funeral rites
ReplyDeleteCLOCHARD: a beggar; a vagrant.
ReplyDeleteCONFISERIE: a shop selling sweets
ReplyDeleteRIPARIAN: relating to or situated on the banks of a river.
ReplyDeleteSOUBRETTE: an actress or other female performer playing a lively, flirtatious role in a play or opera.
ReplyDeleteWANDERVOGEL: a member of a German youth organization founded at the end of the 19th century for the promotion of outdoor activities and folk culture.
ReplyDeleteWELTSCHMERZ: mental depression or apathy caused by comparison of the actual state of the world with an ideal state
ReplyDeleteATAVISM: a tendency to revert to something ancient or ancestral.
ReplyDeleteAEGIS: the protection, backing, or support of a particular person or organization.
ReplyDeleteJINGOISM: extreme patriotism, especially in the form of aggressive or warlike foreign policy.
ReplyDeleteEFFLUVIA: an unpleasant or harmful odor, secretion, or discharge.
ReplyDeletePARNASSUS: A mountain in central Greece, adjacent the site of the ancient city of Delphi, that in Greek mythology was sacred to Apollo and the Corycian nymphs and was the home of the Muses. (figurative) The home of poetry, literature, and learning.
ReplyDeleteBALDERDASH: senseless talk or writing; nonsense.
ReplyDeleteUNCTUOUS: excessively or ingratiatingly flattering
ReplyDeleteANCHORITE: a religious recluse.
ReplyDeleteFOEHN: warm and dry, gusty wind that periodically descends the leeward slopes of nearly all mountains and mountain ranges. The name was first applied to a wind of this kind that occurs in the Alps, where the phenomenon was first studied.
ReplyDeleteVICISSITUDES: a change of circumstances or fortune, typically one that is unwelcome or unpleasant.
ReplyDeletePILLORY: attack or ridicule publicly
ReplyDeleteABSTEMIOUS: not self-indulgent, especially when eating and drinking.
ReplyDeleteDECIDUOUS: (of a tree or shrub) shedding its leaves annually.
ReplyDeleteANTHRACITE: coal of a hard variety that contains relatively pure carbon and burns with little flame and smoke.
ReplyDeleteBACCHANAL: an occasion of wild and drunken revelry.
ReplyDelete