Well here’s a thing: it’s Christine’s 25th Poetry Party at Abbey of the Arts, the inspiration for writing a poem is celebrating the gift of the written word and, despite my life-long love of books and words, no poem will come!
Ironic that the muse has completely deserted me when she should really have been paying attention.
I saw a news item today though that I loved, and I’m going to share it with you instead.
Ammon Shea is a New Yorker who has spent a year reading through all 20 volumes of the Oxford English Dictionary.
He hasn’t done so because he longs to show off long words in conversation. In fact he believes firmly that conversation is about communication and one does not, therefore, use words others are unlikely to understand.
He’s done it because he loves words. This is what he says:
All the normal emotions – grief, happiness and loss – exist in a dictionary but not necessarily in the order that you would think.
If you come across a word like “remord” (to recall with a touch of regret) it’s impossible to read that word without thinking of things that you regret yourself, he says, or to read “unbepissed” (not having been urinated on) without a chuckle.
Knowing what to call something makes me more aware of that thing. For instance, it’s not terribly useful for me to know that [the sound of] leaves rustled by the trees is a psithurism.
I don’t want to walk down the street with my girlfriend saying: ‘Listen, there’s a psithurism.’ But knowing it means I pay more attention to it.
Similarly, knowing that “undisonant” is the adjective to describe the sound of crashing waves and that “apricity” is the warmth of the winter sun brings these things more often to mind.
It’s not easy to use them in conversation and so I enjoy them for their own sake. They are like one-word poems.
You can read the full story (and more delicious words) here. And remember to head over to Abbey of the Arts to see all the wonderful contributions from those whose muse has not deserted them.
What’s your favourite obscure word?
{ 10 comments… read them below or add one }
i have to say that the muse seems to have deserted me on this one too. go figure?!?!?! but i love what you have offered us here. i may even consider putting together a little ditty with these new words. hmmmmm.
This is absolutely delightful Tess, a very fitting offering to the Poetry Party indeed!
Oh there should probably be a law about letting the 3 of you ever get together!!!:)
xoxo
Glad you guys liked it!
Such EXCELLENT words Tess… I shall explore further! I am a bit of a word geek and these appeal to my imagination greatly.
I love the book photo too…
And happy be-lated birthday to you
X R
Rima, I’d love to see your illustrations of some of these words.
ALL – there’s a follow-up article today with readers’ favourite obscure words:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/7659954.stm
Jeez, no one has volunteered any words… I have been searching my brain for suitably obscure words, but the ones I come up with are not as arcane as the ones you cited above. I kind of like “foamy, bubbly, translucent” words, the kind that evaporate even as you type them onto a page. Ex. ephemeral, crepuscular, matutinal, soporific, limpid. They don’t come up — even in my conversation — very often. I have favorites in other languages — do they count? Mostly, I like them for the humour I find in them.
Barbara, of course they count! Crepuscular is one of my faves, having only discovered it a couple of years ago. It has a sort of sinister, vampirish connotation, don’t you think? And is a gorgeous word to say physically. But I’d never heard of its counterpart matutinal – thank you for that.
I’m sure faves in other languages would count!
Well, then, tess, here are a few not uncommon words in other languages that I find delicious:
in French, I love funambule, a tightrope walker, for the “fun” in it, the way the word tumbles out of your mouth, its balance in pronunciation which parallels the balance of the tightrope walker.
in German — aaah, so many! — how about eichhoernchenfaelle? It means squirrel trap. I think one should be awarded at least a bachelor’s degree in German for being able to pronounce it.
in Japanese, I like the onomapoetic words that spice up the language — like kuchi-guchi. Kuchi means mouth and kuchi-guchi describes something passed along by word of mouth.
Oh Barbara, these are wonderful! I’m not sure I could attempt the German, but I love funambule – ambling for the fun of it over certain death!
And kuchi-guchi for some reason immediately called to mind that funny scene in one of Cary Grant’s movies where he’s playing a party game passing oranges along to the next person by grasping them under his chin!