abracadabra

/ˌæbɹəkəˈdæbɹə/

From Late Latin abracadabra, a word used in magical writings, of unknown origin. Relationships have been suggested with Abraxas (a Gnostic deity), and with various Aramaic or Hebrew terms עַבְרָא כְּדַבְרָא (avra kedavra, literally “what was said has come to pass”), עַבְדָא כְּדַבְרָא (avda kedavra, literally “what was said has been done”); אַרְבַּע-אֶחַד-אַרְבַּע (arba-eḥad-arba, literally “four-one-four”), but there is little supporting evidence.

unk

unknown

Where is the necessity of this provision in the Constitution? […] Can anyone believe that we, by any amendments of ours, by any of our scribbling on that parchment, by any amulet, any legerdemain—charm—Abrecadabra—of ours can prevent our sons from doing the same thing—that is, from doing as they please, just as we are doing as we please? It is impossible. Who can bind posterity?

1851, Hugh A. Garland, quoting John Randolph of Roanoke, “The Virginia Convention—Every Change is Not Reform”, in The Life of John Randolph of Roanoke, volume II, New York: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC, page 329:

With a quiet bank holiday afternoon to fill, the Mill yesterday dug out the old magic kit, brushed the cobwebs off its top hat and practiced a few abracadabras.

2012 August 28, Georgina Turner, The Guardian:

A use of the mystical term ‘abracadabra’, supposed to work as part of a healing charm or a magical spell; any spell or incantation making use of the word.

I don’t know all the theoretical abracadabra about how it works, I’m only its pilot.

Astrology was not specifically banned in the statutes against witchcraft, but so long as its technicalities remained abracadabra to the lay public there was always a risk that the practitioner might find himself arrested for sorcery.

1971, Keith Thomas, Religion and the Decline of Magic, Folio Society 2012, page 335:

Mumbo jumbo; obscure language or technicalities; jargon.

wartaal

mumbo jumbo, obscure language or technicalities, jargon — see also mumbo jumbo, jargon


abracadabra

/ˌæbɹəkəˈdæbɹə/

unknown

Next, the conjuror filled a glass with water from a big jug and then covered the tumbler with a cloth. "Abracadabra," he cried and crumpled the cloth.

1971, Richard Carpenter, Catweazle and the Magic Zodiac, Harmondsworth: Puffin Books, page 49:

Used to indicate that a magic trick or other illusion has been performed.

abrakadabra

used to indicate that a magic trick or other illusion has been performed


finale

From Italian finale (“ending”), from Late Latin fīnālis, from Latin fīnis (“end; boundary, limit”). Doublet of final.

(narratology) The chronological conclusion of a series of narrative works.


quest

en-verb

quest (third-person singular simple present quests, present participle questing, simple past and past participle quested)

quests (present singular third-person)
questing (participle present)
quested (participle past)
quested (past)

From Middle English quest, queste; partly from Anglo-Norman queste, Old French queste (“acquisition, search, hunt”), and partly from their source, Latin quaesta (“tribute, tax, inquiry, search”), noun use of quaesita, the feminine past participle of quaerere (“to ask, seek”).

der

Next day we quested in search of our caravan, and after some pains recovered it.

1634, Thomas Herbert, Description of the Persian Monarchy now beinge the Orientall Indyes, Iles and other ports of the Greater Asia and Africk:

(transitive) To search for something; to seek.


interquel

Patterned after prequel, as pre- meaning "before" and inter- meaning "between."

(narratology) An installment in a series of works set chronologically between two of its predecessors.

(narratology) Any middle sequel with an earlier and a later installment. This usage may not be proper.


prequel

Patterned after sequel using pre- (“before”).

'Prequels' are sequels that relate the story that preceded the original film.

1980, Patrick Robertson, Movie Facts and Feats: A Guinness Record Book, New York: Sterling Publishing, page 43:

2008, 26 February, Andrew Pierce, "JRR Tolkien's estate to sue Lord of the Rings filmmakers New Line Cinema over profits, in The Daily Telegraph
They are also threatening to block the production of the long-awaited prequel, The Hobbit, which may now be cancelled.

(narratology) In a series of works, an installment that is set chronologically before its predecessor, especially the original narrative or (perhaps improper usage) any narrative work with at least one sequel.

preqüela

in a series of works, an installment that is set chronologically before its predecessor


sequel

→ Catalan: seqüela (semantic loan)

→ Polish: sequel

→ Russian: си́квел (síkvel)

From Middle English sequele, sequelle, sequile, from Middle French sequele, sequelle and its etymon, Latin sequēla, from sequī (“to follow”). Doublet of sequela.

(narratology) A narrative that is written after another narrative set in the same universe, especially a narrative that is chronologically set after its predecessors, or (perhaps improper usage) any narrative that has a preceding narrative of its own.

продължение

a narrative written after another narrative set in the same universe

продолже́ние

кни́ги, фи́льма


universe

From Middle English universe, from Old French univers, from Latin universum (“all things, as a whole, the universe”), neuter of universus (“all together, whole, entire, collective, general, literally turned or combined into one”), from uni-, combining form of unus (“one”) + versus (“turned”), perfect passive participle of vertō (“to turn”). Analyzable as uni- + -verse through backformation of -verse.

Alternative letter-case form of Universe; Our universe.


universe

God does not play dice with the universe

The sum of everything that exists in the cosmos.

An entity similar to our universe; one component of a larger entity known as the multiverse.

Under our new World may alſo be compriſed thoſe vaſt Southern Coaſts and Streights of Magelan, firſt lighted on by Ferdinandus Magelanus in the year 1520, in his Circumnavigation of the Univerſe ; which forty five years after Sir Francis Drake, and next Sir Thomas Bendiſh, Engliſhmen, made a furhter inſpection into ; and in the Year 1600 Oliver van Noord a Hollander paſt, but of later years a Spaniard, Fedinand de Quier, out-ſhot them all by a more ample Diſcovery then all the former.

1669, John Nievhoff, translated by John Ogilby, An Embassy from the Eaſt-India Company of the United Provinces, to the Grand Tartar Cham Emperour of China, London: John Macock, →OCLC, pages 3–4:

(archaic) The Earth, the sphere of the world.


protagonist

Penguin Books
The Independent
The Sense of Style
protagonist

From Ancient Greek πρωταγωνιστής (prōtagōnistḗs, “a chief actor”), from πρῶτος (prôtos, “first”) + ἀγωνιστής (agōnistḗs, “a combatant, pleader, actor”). By surface analysis, prot- (“first”) + agonist (“combatant, participant”).

πρωταγωνιστής

surf

(authorship) The main character, or one of the main characters, in any story, such as a literary work or drama.

(proscribed) An advocate or champion of a cause or course of action.


hook

sometimes in Northern England and Ireland, otherwise obsolete

From Middle English hoke, from Old English hōc, from Proto-West Germanic *hōk, from Proto-Germanic *hōkaz, variant of *hakô (“hook”), probably ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *kog-, *keg-, *keng- (“peg, hook, claw”).
Cognates
Compare West Frisian heak, Dutch haak (“hook”)) (compare West Frisian/Dutch hoek (“hook, angle, corner”), Low German Hook, Huuk); also related to hake.

The hook of Good Boys, Hollywood's latest odyssey of comic adolescent mischief, is that the kids behaving badly are, for once, truly kids.

2019 August 14, A. A. Dowd, “Good Boys Puts a Tween Spin on the R-rated Teen Comedy, to Mostly Funny Effect”, in The A.V. Club, archived from the original on 2021-03-04:

(narratology) A gimmick or element of a creative work intended to be attention-grabbing for the audience; a compelling idea for a story that will be sure to attract people's attention.


Christmas

en-proper noun

Christmas (countable and uncountable, plural Christmases or Christmasses)

Christmases (plural)
Christmasses (plural)

→ Afrikaans: Krismis

desctree

→ Gilbertese: Kiritimati
→ English: Kiritimati

→ Golin: geresma

→ Hawaiian: Kalikimaka

desc

→ Hindi: क्रिसमस (krismas), क्रिस्मस (krismas)

→ Hopi: Kyesmis

→ Maori: Kirihimete

→ Mon: ခရေတ်သမာတ်

→ Mon: ခရေတ်သမာတ်

→ Burmese: ခရစ္စမတ် (hka.racca.mat)

→ Japanese: クリスマス (Kurisumasu)

→ Korean: 크리스마스 (Keuriseumaseu)

→ Spanish: Crismes

→ Swahili: Krismasi

The proper noun is derived from Middle English Cristemasse, Criste-mas (“Christmas Day; season of Christmas; Christmas festivities”) [and other forms], from Old English Cristes mæsse (“Christmas”, literally “Christ’s mass”), from Crist (“Christ”) + -es (possessive marker) + mæsse (“a mass (celebration of the Eucharist)”). The English word is analysable as Christ + -mas (suffix denoting a holiday or sacred day).
The noun, adjective, and verb are derived from the proper noun.
Adjective sense 1 (“red and green in colour”) refers to these colours being traditionally associated with Christmas.

suffix

Do you celebrate Christmas?

This Christmas we’ll open presents, then go to grandma’s for dinner.

Be gladde, lordes, bothe more and lasse, / For this hath ordeyned our stewarde / To chere you all this christmasse / The bores heed with mustarde.

[[15th century] (date written), “A Caroll Bringyng in the Bores Heed”, in [Christmasse Carolles], London: […] Wynkyn de Worde, published 1521, →OCLC; republished in Joseph Ames, Typographical Antiquities: Being a Historical Account of Printing in England: […], London: […] W[illiam] Faden, and sold by J. Robinson, […], 1749, →OCLC, page 96, column 2:

In this Winter was great death in London, wherefore the Terme was adiorned, and the king for to eſchue the plague, kept his Chriſtmaſſe at Eltham with a ſmall number, for no man might come thether, but ſuch as were appoynted by name: this Chriſtmas in the kings houſe, was called the ſtill Chriſtmaſſe.

1569, Richard Grafton, “Henry the Eyght”, in A Chronicle at Large and Meere History of the Affayres of Englande […], volume II, London: […] Henry Denham, […], for Richarde Tottle and Humffrey Toye, →OCLC, pages 1140–1141:

Kinde Gentlemen, and honeſt Companions, I preſent you here with a merrie conceited Comedie, called the Shoomakers Holyday, acted by my Lorde Admiralls Players this preſent Chriſtmaſſe, before the Queenes moſt excellent Maieſtie.

1599 (first performance; published 1600), Thomas Dekker, “The Shomakers Holiday. Or The Gentle Craft. […]. To All Good Fellowes, Professors of the Gentle Craft; of what Degree Soeuer.”, in The Dramatic Works of Thomas Dekker […], volume I, London: John Pearson […], published 1873, →OCLC, page 3:

Hereupon a Peace vvas concluded, vvhich vvas publiſhed a little before Chriſtmaſſe, in the Fourteenth yeare of the Kings Raigne, to continue for both the Kings liues, and the ouer-liuer of them, and a yeare after.

1622, Francis, Lord Verulam, Viscount St. Alban [i.e. Francis Bacon], The Historie of the Raigne of King Henry the Seventh, […], London: […] W[illiam] Stansby for Matthew Lownes, and William Barret, →OCLC, page 191:

Chriſtmaſſe commeth but once a yeere.

1623, M. N. [pseudonym; William Camden], “Certaine Prouerbes, Poemes or Poesies, Epigrammes, Rhythmes, and Epitaphs of the English Nation in Former Times, and Some of This Present Age”, in Remaines, Concerning Britaine: […], 3rd edition, London: […] Nicholas Okes, for Simon Waterson, […], →OCLC, page 267:

[T]heſe Ships […] meet vvith Privateers, vvho reſort hither in the aforeſaid months [May to August], purpoſely to keep a Chriſtmas as they call it; being ſure to meet vvith Liquor enough to be merry vvith, and are very liberal to thoſe that treat them.

1697, William Dampier, chapter III, in A New Voyage Round the World. […], London: […] James Knapton, […], →OCLC, page 56:

[…] I was always grateful for the sum of my week's profit, and at Christmas for that of the whole year.

1712 August 17 (Gregorian calendar), [Richard Steele], “WEDNESDAY, August 6, 1712”, in The Spectator, number 450; republished in Alexander Chalmers, editor, The Spectator; a New Edition, […], volume V, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton & Company, 1853, →OCLC, page 220:

The lord chancellor holds his fittings in this hall, and in former days, like the Temple, it had its revels and great Chriſtmaſſes. […] The account of the great feaſt in the hall of the Inner Temple, by the ſerjeants, in 1555, is extremely worth conſulting: and alſo of the hoſpitable Chriſtmaſſes of old times.

1798 July, “Account of Lincoln’s Inn: With a Perspective View of the Hall and Chapel”, in The Universal Magazine of Knowledge and Pleasure; […], volume CIII, London: […] W[illiam] Bent, […], →OCLC, page 42, column 2:

[A] great deal of revelry was permitted, and even encouraged, by the squire, throughout the twelve days of Christmas, provided every thing was done comformably to ancient usage. […] [T]he Yule clog, and Christmas candle, were regularly burnt, and the mistletoe, with its white berries, hung up, to the imminent peril of all the pretty housemaids.

1820 January 1, Geoffrey Crayon [pseudonym; Washington Irving], “Christmas Eve”, in The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent., number V, New York, N.Y.: […] C[ornelius] S. Van Winkle, […], →OCLC, page 379:

“Lawk!” says our old granddam, who has taken the liberty of looking over our manuscript while we were gone to mix a glass of water and something. “Lawk!” says she, “how can you write such stuff? Christmas, indeed! you’ve no Christmas now. Do you call this Christmas? It’s more like a vapour bath. Such weather! Lawk, how times are changed! the Christmasses I remember! the good, old-fashioned Christmasses, when there was snow on the ground six feet deep, and poor people were starved to death by dozens, and you couldn’t go out without having your fingers frost-bitten, and coals were at six shillings a hundred, and canals froze up so that you couldn’t get your goods, and the roads all impassable, and daren’t ask a few friends to merrymake for fear of losing three or four of ’em going home in snow-drifts, and—oh, those were Christmasses! we shall never see such times again!”

1840 January, Sylvanus Swanquill [pseudonym; John Hewitt], “Merry Christmas and Happy New Year”, in The New Sporting Magazine, volume XVIII, number 105, London: Walter Spiers, […], →OCLC, page 53:

[I]t was always said of him [Ebenezer Scrooge], that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed this knowledge. May that be truly said of us, and all of us! And so, as Tiny Tim observed, God Bless Us, Every One!

1843 December 19, Charles Dickens, “Stave Five. The End of It.”, in A Christmas Carol. In Prose. Being a Ghost Story of Christmas, London: Chapman & Hall, […], →OCLC, page 166:

The time draws near the birth of Christ: / The moon is hid; the night is still; / The Christmas bells from hill to hill / Answer each other in the mist.

1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], In Memoriam, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC, Canto XXVIII, page 45:

Reader have your Christmasses hitherto been marked with happiness? Thank God for it. […] Then mamma died—and later in your college days, dear Herbert, when you were both as tall as men, but as fond of play as ever—and we used to spend such happy Christmasses, till our dear father died, / “That was our first sad winter, the one which followed his death, for you remember how sadly we all missed him, and we were still in mourning—but the next one was a happy day, for Lawry was so full of spirits—and that was our last happy Christmas. Herbert darling, Lawrence has left the last impression of happiness on my memory—he, who has since broken up our domestic peace, and for a long time spoilt our Christmasses—Heaven bless him![…]”

1859, [Florence] Marryatt, chapter XXIX, in Temper. A Novel., New York, N.Y.: Dick & Fitzgerald, […], →OCLC, page 205:

Love came down at Christmas, / Love all lovely, Love Divine, / Love was born at Christmas, / Star and Angels gave the sign.

1885, Christina G[eorgina] Rossetti, “December 29 [Love Came Down at Christmas]”, in Time Flies: A Reading Diary […], London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge […], →OCLC, page 251:

I'm dreaming of a white Christmas / With every Christmas card I write / May your days be merry and bright / And may all your Christmases be white

1942 July 30, Irving Berlin (lyrics and music), “White Christmas”, performed by Bing Crosby, New York, N.Y.: Decca Records, →OCLC:

Have yourself a merry little Christmas / Let your heart be light / Next year all our troubles will be out of sight

1943 (date written), “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas”, in Ralph Blane (lyrics), Hugo Martin (music), Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas: From the M.G.M. Picture Meet Me in St. Louis, performed by Judy Garland, New York, N.Y.: Leo Feist, published 1944, →OCLC:

The last time I saw her was a week before Christmas, 1980. We took down a fat branch of berried Megginch holly, which we stuck in a pot for a Christmas tree, hung with silver balls and glitters. Aunt Victoria looked at it, smiled and unexpectedly said, “Christmas.” Surely she was sitting there dreaming of Christmasses long past: Christmas in the South China Sea, the Christmas lights of Hong Kong, hot Christmasses so long ago in the Anchises under the Southern Cross stars, or even longer ago of Christmasses at Megginch, singing carols round the lighted Christmas tree in the hall, while Queen Victoria’s goddaughter in her starched white dress and bronze shoes had worn the sparkling pendant given her by the great Queen.

1994, Cherry Drummond, The Remarkable Life of Victoria Drummond, Marine Engineer, London: The Institute of Marine Engineers, →ISBN, page 354:

I don't want a lot for Christmas / There is just one thing I need / I don't care about the presents / Underneath the Christmas tree / I just want you for my own / More than you could ever know / Make my wish come true / All I want for Christmas is you

1994 October 29, Mariah Carey, Walter Afanasieff (lyrics and music), “All I Want for Christmas Is You”, in Merry Christmas, performed by Mariah Carey, New York, N.Y.: Columbia Records, →OCLC:

This is not the first time a city in China has clamped down on Christmas merriment. Last December, Hengyang, a city in Hunan province, issued a stern notice asking Communist Party officials and their relatives to “resist the rampant Western festival.” The China Communist Youth League in Anhui wrote on social media last year that “Christmas is China’s day of shame” and represents a latter-day invasion by the West.

2018 December 19, Tiffany May, “Chinese City Bans Christmas Displays Amid Religious Crackdown”, in The Washington Post, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2018-12-19, Asia Pacific:

Western Christianity
Western Christianity

(originally Christianity) A festival or holiday commemorating the birth of Jesus Christ and incorporating various Christian, pre-Christian, pagan, and secular customs, which in Western Christianity is celebrated on December 25 (Christmas Day) in most places.

Kersfees

festival or holiday commemorating the birth of Jesus Christ which in Western Christianity is celebrated on December 25 in most places

ܥܹܐܕܵܐ ܕܡܵܘܠܵܕܵܐ

ˁēdā dmāwlādā

A number of places in the United States:

An uninhabited mining community in Gila County, Arizona.

An unincorporated community in Au Train Township, Alger County, Michigan.

An unincorporated community in Bolivar County, Mississippi


Christmas

Short for Jiminy Christmas, probably a variant of Jiminy Cricket or Jiminy Crickets, a euphemism for Jesus Christ.

"Christmas! I didn't know it," said Harvey, turning round. "I'll give you a dollar for it when I—get my wages. Say, I'll give you two dollars."

1897, Rudyard Kipling, Captains Courageous:

"I've been tottering on the edge … Christmas!" His eyes brightened with a sudden thought. "How stupid I've been!" he cried at once.

1930, Ellery Queen [pseudonym; Frederic Dannay, Manfred Bennington Lee], “‘The Time has Come …’”, in The French Powder Mystery: A Problem in Deduction, New York, N.Y.: Frederick A[bbott] Stokes Company, →OCLC, page 269:

She said, "All right with you, Bertie?" / "Oh Christmas! he said. "I suppose so."

1959, Ngaio Marsh, “On the Scent”, in False Scent, New York, N.Y.: Jove Books, published November 1981, →ISBN, section 3, page 158:

(euphemistic) An expression of annoyance or surprise: Christ, Jesus Christ, Jiminy Cricket, Jiminy Crickets.


arc

Inherited from Middle English ark, from Old French arc, from Latin arcus (“a bow, arc, arch”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *h₂erkʷos (“bow, arrow”). Doublet of arch, arco, and arrow.

der

For while most comics have designated entry points into the story in the form of arcs, Homestuck is one elaborate, self-referencing inside joke collapsed inside its own funhouse mirror reflection.

2015 February 24, Lilian Min, “How the Internet Invented a New Kind of Storytelling”, in The Atlantic:


antagonist

From Latin antagonista, from Ancient Greek ἀνταγωνιστής (antagōnistḗs, “opponent”) (ἀντί (antí, “against”) + ἀγωνιστής (agōnistḗs, “a combatant, pleader, actor”)), from ἀνταγωνίζεσθαι (antagōnízesthai, “antagonize”).

ἀνταγωνιστής

So God forbid I'm seen just as an average human being / I mean, imagine if antagonists lacked any evil scheme

2022, Will Wood (musician) (lyrics and music), “The Main Character”, in In case I make it,, performed by Will Wood:

(authorship) The main character or force opposing the protagonist in a literary work or drama.


once upon a time

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Persent101-once upon a time.wav

Once upon a time, in a faraway land, there lived a beautiful princess.

There was once upon a time a charcoal-burner who had a son, and he was also a charcoal-burner.

1886, Peter Christen Asbjørnsen, translated by H.L. Brækstad, Folk and Fairy Tales, page 308:

Long before popular music evolved its many genres and subgenres, the industry was driven by a simple one-size-fits-all philosophy […] Songwriters, once upon a time, wrote songs for the masses.

2012, Christoper Zara, chapter 2, in Tortured Artists: From Picasso and Monroe to Warhol and Winehouse, the Twisted Secrets of the World's Most Creative Minds, page {{{pg}}}:

Once upon a time, there was a Goblin Queen
And she lived in a grand palace...

2023, A. C. MacDonald, Twistwood Tales (comic), Andrews McMeel, →ISBN, page 138:

A long time ago; at some time in the past (a traditional beginning of children's stories, especially fairy tales).

agwa

traditional beginning of children’s stories, especially fairy tales

iq̇o da ara iq̇o ra, ɣvtis uḳetesi ra ikneboda

იყო და არა იყო რა, ღვთის უკეთესი რა იქნებოდა


non sequitur

en-noun

non sequitur (plural non sequiturs or non sequuntur)

non sequiturs (plural)
non sequuntur (plural)

Learned borrowing from Latin phrase nōn sequitur (“it does not follow”).

what does that have to do with the price of tea in China

Having a costumed superhero abduct the vicar was an utter non sequitur in the novel.

Non sequiturs, gratuitous acts, frustrating ellipses, ambiguities, a dearth of emotion: Miss [Lillian] Hellman avails herself of all these current techniques in telling a story that she keeps telling us may not be a story at all.

1980 May 13, Anatole Broyard, “Books of The Times”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:

(narratology) Any abrupt and inexplicable transition or occurrence.

Gedankensprung

any abrupt and inexplicable transition or occurrence


reveal

From Middle English revēlen, from Old French reveler, from Latin revēlāre (“to reveal, uncover”), from re- (“back, again”) + vēlāre (“to cover”), from vēlum (“veil”).

The comedian had been telling us about his sleep being disturbed by noise. Then came the reveal: he was sleeping on a bed in a department store.

A simple dolly or crane move can be used for an effective reveal. A subject fills the frame, then with a move, something else is revealed.

2002, Blain Brown, Cinematography, →ISBN:

Once you find out what’s going on—the girl is a “hungry,” this film’s term for zombies—it’s still interesting enough, if not quite as powerful. That’s basically what you’re in for with this British postapocalyptic survival horror tale, which starts off strong but dilutes its impact with every consecutive reveal.

2017 February 23, Katie Rife, “The Girl With All The Gifts tries to put a fresh spin on overripe zombie clichés”, in The Onion AV Club:

Even Westworld—based on a science-fiction novel where robots run amok—ended its second season with the ultimate reveal: human beings are simpler and more predictable than the artificial intelligences we create.

2019, Douglas Rushkoff, “Survival of the Richest”, in Extinction Rebellion, editor, This Is Not A Drill, London: Penguin, →ISBN:

(cinematography, narratology, comedy, usually informal) A revelation; an uncovering of what was hidden in the scene or story.


red herring

red herring (plural red herrings or red herring)

red herrings (plural)
red herring (plural)

One possible origin of the idiom was that red herring were used to train dogs to track scents. This was true, but the modern meaning of a false trail may have been popularised in a news story by English journalist William Cobbett, c. 1805, in which he claimed that as a boy he used a red herring (a cured and salted herring) to mislead hounds following a trail; the story served as an extended metaphor for the London press, which had earned Cobbett's ire by publishing false news accounts regarding Napoleon. The OED has another possible earlier origin in the legacy of clergyman Jasper Mayne in 1672 when he misled a servant by leaving him "Somewhat that would make him Drink after his Death" in a large trunk. When the trunk was opened, the contents were found to be red herring.
(soldier): An allusion to soldiers' red uniforms; soldier is, reciprocally, a slang term for the fish.

neither fish, flesh, nor good red herring

red herring prospectus
red herring prospectus


description

description (countable and uncountable, plural descriptions)

From Middle English descripcioun, from Old French description and its etymon, Latin dēscrīptiō, noun of action of dēscrībō (“I describe”).

(linguistics) The act or practice of recording and describing actual language usage in a given speech community, as opposed to prescription, i.e. laying down norms of language usage.

kuvailu

linguistics: act or practice of recording and describing actual language usage


narrative

narrative (countable and uncountable, plural narratives)

The plot is full of holes, but the narrative is extremely compelling.

The player is free to create their own narrative within a much larger set of possible designed narrative options, or, given the geographic and dialogical openness of Morrowind, to refuse the creation of any narrative but their own and wander aimlessly through the game.

2015, Angus Slater, “Prophecy, Pre-destination, and Free-form Gameplay: The Nerevarine Prophecy in Bethesda’s ‘Morrowind’”, in Online: Heidelberg Journal of Religions on the Internet, volume 7, →DOI, page 175:

(creative writing) A manner of conveying a story, fictional or otherwise, in a body of work.


reboot

(narratology) The restarting of a series' storyline, discarding all previous continuity.

reboot

the restarting of a series' storyline, discarding all previous continuity


deus ex machina

deus ex machina (plural dei ex machina or dei ex machinis or deus ex machinas)

dei ex machina (plural)
dei ex machinis (plural)
deus ex machinas (plural)

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Persent101-deus ex machina.wav

Unadapted borrowing from Latin deus ex māchinā (literally “god from a machine, i.e., a device, a scaffolding, an artifice”), from Ancient Greek.

ubor

The women who merge in the final pages leave me unsettled and depressed. Their future is grim. There is no deus ex machina to save them.

1975 December 13, Regina Kahney, “Sister Gin (review)”, in Gay Community News, volume 3, number 24, page 13:

The repeated tactic of deus ex machina (without a deus) has a deplorable effect on both the plot and the dialogue.

2007 August 12, Christopher Hitchens, “Harry Potter: The Boy Who Lived”, in New York Times:

Despite the government shutdown, at the end of the last season Knope is able to put on a children's concert in the abandoned lot she's been trying to turn into a park due to a quick deus ex machina.

2011 January 20, Dave Thier, “‘Parks and Recreation’: Comedy Imitates Life (Sort Of)”, in The Atlantic:

Compared to that, the season-four finale “Server Error” felt comparatively tame, focusing mostly on Richard’s maniacal efforts to create a new kind of internet, which were helped along by a confusing deus ex machina.

2017 June 26, David Sims, “How Will ‘Silicon Valley’ Work Without T.J. Miller?”, in The Atlantic:

suspension of disbelief
suspension of disbelief

(authorship) Any resolution to a story that does not pay due regard to the story's internal logic and that is so unlikely that it challenges suspension of disbelief, and presumably allows the author, director, or developer to end the story in the way that they desired.

I was going to wait for Monsieur Hyppolyte and, like a craven, hand the whole thing over to him. Let the deus ex machina fly in out of the clouds...

1959, Mary Stewart, chapter XVII, in Nine Coaches Waiting, M. S. Mill Company, page 268:

(historical, literary) A deity in Greek and Roman drama who was brought in by stage machinery to intervene in a difficult situation (i.e., to resolve a crisis, or untangle issues surrounding it, a character logically expected to do so).

(historical) A machine used to bring an actor playing a god onto the stage, either up through a trapdoor or (e.g. by crane) from above.


magic wand

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-magic wand.wav

A wand, usually made of wood, that is used to perform magic.


fridge

→ Antillean Creole: fridj

→ Bengali: ফ্রিজ (phrij)

→ Hindi: फ़्रिज (frij), फ्रिज (phrij)

→ Malayalam: ഫ്രിഡ്ജ് (phriḍjŭ)

→ Maltese: friġġ

→ Scottish Gaelic: frids

→ Swahili: friji

Alexandra DeWitt
Chicago Review Press
Frigidaire
Kyle Rayner
Women in Refrigerators

The noun is a clipping of refrigerator, perhaps influenced by the Frigidaire brand of refrigerators, or frigerator (“(dated) refrigerator”). The spelling is likely influenced by analogy with bridge, ridge, etc. The verb is derived from the noun.
The fandom slang verb sense alludes to the phrase "women in refrigerators" coined by the American comic book writer Gail Simone. Simone was referencing a plot point in Green Lantern (volume 3, issue 54, 1994), in which the Green Lantern's girlfriend is murdered by a villain, and her body placed in a refrigerator for him to find.

coinage

Sweet broccolini with tofu, sesame, and cilantro […] First, marinate the tofu. In a bowl, whisk the soy sauce, chile sauce, and sesame oil together. Cut the tofu into strips about ⅜ inch / 1 cm thick, mix gently (so it doesn't break) with the marinade, and leave in the fridge for half an hour.

2008, Yotam Ottolenghi, Sami Tamimi, “Vegetables, Legumes, and Grains”, in Ottolenghi: The Cookbook, New York, N.Y.: Ten Speed Press, published 2013, →ISBN:


fridge

en-verb

fridge (third-person singular simple present fridges, present participle fridging, simple past and past participle fridged)

fridges (present singular third-person)
fridging (participle present)
fridged (participle past)
fridged (past)

The backing cast are also all excellent, as expected considering the calibre of actors attached to the film – Andrea Riseborough is a very good example, playing a fascinating cop who really didn't deserve to be ‘fridged’ (meaning: removed from the action so that the men can do their manly things).

2013 April 26, Siobhan Whitebread, “Welcome to the Punch: A Little Less Conversation [film review]”, in Sophie Harrison, editor, Spark*: The University of Reading’s Student Newspaper, volume 63, number 1, Reading, Berkshire: Reading University Students’ Union, →OCLC, page 15, column 5:

In terms of villains, familiar characters haven't been fridged but they've been rather sexualized.

2014, Tim Hanley, “The Mundane Modern Age”, in Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World’s Most Famous Heroine, Chicago, Ill.: Chicago Review Press, →ISBN, part 3 (The Bronze Age), page 240:

Gwen [Stacy] dying is as big a part of Spider-Man's storyline as Uncle Ben dying. But originally, she was fridged, long before that was a thing. Gwen was something of a pretty nonentity in the comics, her death really only served the purpose of hurting Peter. She died a victim, yanked around by other characters.

2014 June 1, Dave Van Domelen, “Dave’s Capsules for May 2014”, in alt.toys.transformers (Usenet):

There’s more than a hint of fridging to Missandei's death, as she leaves behind a grief-stricken Grey Worm along with Daenerys [Targaryen].

2019 May 5, Danette Chavez, “Campaigns are Waged On and Off the Game Of Thrones Battlefield (Newbies)”, in The A.V. Club, archived from the original on 2021-01-28:

2022 March 12, Rich Johnston, “Gail Simone's "Fridging" Becomes Official DC Comics Terminology”, in Bleeding Cool, retrieved 2022-03-12:

(transitive, fandom slang) To gratuitously kill, disempower, or otherwise remove (a character, usually female) from a narrative, often strictly to hurt another character (usually male) and motivate vengeance.


story

desctree

Sranan Tongo: tori
Aukan: toli
→ Dutch: tori

→ Welsh: stori

→ Persian: استوری (estori)

→ Portuguese: estória

From Middle English storie, storye, from Anglo-Norman estorie by aphesis. The Anglo-Norman word itself comes from Latin historia, a borrowing from Ancient Greek ἱστορίᾱ (historíā, “learning through research”). Doublet of history and storey.

der

...it must be exploded for fabulous, with other relics of ancient story...

1673, William Temple, An Essay upon the Advancement of Trade in Ireland:

June 1861, Edinburgh Review, The Kingdom of Italy
Venice, with its unique city and its impressive story...

The stories did not seem to me to touch life. They were plainly intended to have a bracing moral effect, and perhaps had this result for the people at whom they were aimed. They left me with the impression of a well-delivered stereopticon lecture, with characters about as life-like as the shadows on the screen, and whisking on and off, at the mercy of the operator.

1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter I, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC:

So, what happened?
It's quite a long story actually...
Really? Don't worry about it then.

2006 Feb. 17, Graham Linehan, The IT Crowd, Season 1, Episode 4

Even without hovering drones, a lurking assassin, a thumping score and a denouement, the real-life story of Edward Snowden, a rogue spy on the run, could be straight out of the cinema. But, as with Hollywood, the subplots and exotic locations may distract from the real message: America’s discomfort and its foes’ glee.

2013 June 29, “Travels and travails”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8842, page 55:

The book tells the story of two roommates.

What will she do without being able to watch her stories?

He stood on the doorstep for a minute, listening for sounds inside the house — a radio, a TV tuned to one of the stories […]

(US, colloquial, usually pluralized) A soap opera.

What's the story with him?

I tried it again; same story, no error message, nothing happened.

The images it captured help tell a story of extreme loss: 25 percent of its ice and four of its 19 glaciers have disappeared since 1957.

A sequence of events, or a situation, such as might be related in an account.


Grim Reaper

/ˈɡɹɪm ˈɹiː.pə/

/ˈɡɹɪm ˈɹi.pɚ/

From grim + reaper, first attested 1847. The word grim previously had a stronger meaning ("fierce, angry, sinister") and had more of an association with ghostliness (compare Old English grima (“specter, apparition”), English grim (n.)). The association between grim and death dates back to at least the late 16th century (the line "grim death, how foul and loathsome is thine image" appears in Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew around 1590). The reaper element comes from the personification of Death as a reaper (harvester) of souls in connection to to the popular depiction of Death wielding a scythe. The symbol of the scythe itself comes from a partially unintentional conflation of Cronus (the Titan associated with the harvest, said to have used his scythe to castrate his father Uranus) and Chronos (the personification of Father Time).

cog

Her husband was dead, and Werper fancied that he could replace in the girl’s heart the position which had been vacated by the act of the grim reaper.

1916, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar:

"Golly, I feel like the devil!" muttered Anthony dispassionately. Relaxing, he tumbled back upon his pillow. "Bring on your grim reaper!"

1922, F[rancis] Scott Fitzgerald, The Beautiful and Damned, New York, N.Y.: Charles Scribner’s Sons, →OCLC, book 2, page 220:

Mary, will you be mine? Shall we go round together? Will you fix up a match with me on the links of life which shall end only when the Grim Reaper lays us both a stymie?

1922, P. G. Wodehouse, The Clicking of Cuthbert:

On the one hand, we had a scenario where, effectively, the American admiral just went "You know what, all the destroyers attack", at which point they mowed through the Japanese destroyers like a Grim Reaper through a harvest of very, very dead gorn, especially with the Brooklyns in support.

2019 March 6, Drachinifel, 25:58 from the start, in The Battle of Samar (Alternate History) - Bring on the Battleships!, archived from the original on 2022-07-04:

But that is the likely outcome if the railway waits for Treasury's grim reaper to come a-calling.

2021 January 13, Nigel Harris, “Comment: Make freight an equal priority”, in Rail, page 3:

A personification of Death as an old man, or a skeleton, carrying a scythe, taking souls to the afterlife.

Chronos
Cronus
The Taming of the Shrew
Uranus_(mythology)

стару́ха с косо́й f (starúxa s kosój, literally “old woman with scythe”)


plot

From Middle English plot, plotte, from Old English plot (“a plot of ground”), from Proto-Germanic *plataz, *platjaz (“a patch”), of uncertain origin. Cognate with Middle Low German plet (“patch, strip of cloth, rags”), German Bletz (“rags, bits, strip of land”), Gothic 𐍀𐌻𐌰𐍄𐍃 (plats, “a patch, rags”). See also plat. See also complot for an influence on or source of sense 5.
Sense 9 is a back-formation from for the plot.

If the plot or intrigue must be natural, and such as springs from the subject, then the winding up of the plot must be a probable consequence of all that went before.

c. 1725, Alexander Pope, View of the Epic Poem:

(narratology) The course of a story, comprising a series of incidents which are gradually unfolded, sometimes by unexpected means.


conperson

en-noun

conperson (plural conpeople or conpersons)

(informal) A fictional person, especially one supposed to inhabit a conworld and speak a conlang.


narrator

(narratology) The person or the "voice" whose viewpoint is used in telling a story.


genre

Unadapted borrowing from French genre, from Old French gen(d)re, borrowed from Latin genere. Doublet of gender and genus.

The still life has been a popular genre in painting since the 17th century.

This film is a cross-genre piece, dark and funny at the same time.

The computer game Half-Life redefined the first-person shooter genre.

One of the difficulties that plague conversations about industrial music is that the genre has come to include (to the chagrin and outright denial of some purists) anything from gentle synthesized droning to metal-inspired riffage.

2013, S. Alexander Reed, Assimilate: A Critical History of Industrial Music, page 38:

A kind; a stylistic category or sort, especially of literature or other artworks.


genre

en-verb

genre (third-person singular simple present genres, present participle genring or genreing, simple past and past participle genred)

genres (present singular third-person)
genring (participle present)
genreing (participle present)
genred (participle past)
genred (past)

For quotations using this term, see Citations:genre.

To assign or conform to a genre, to make genre-specific.


motif

From French motif (1848), with the meaning of "main idea or theme". Doublet of motive.

(music) A short melodic or lyrical passage that is repeated in several parts of a work.

мотив

music: short melodic passage that is repeated in several parts of a work


heroism

en-noun

heroism (countable and uncountable, plural heroisms)

/ˈhɛɹəʊɪzəm/

/ˈhɛɹoʊɪzəm/

From French héroïsme, equivalent to hero + -ism.

At the time, with the D-Day invasion of Europe going on, their heroism was hardly noticed. Plenty of other heroes were dying elsewhere. Plenty of bigger bits of history were being made.

2022 January 12, Benedict le Vay, “The heroes of Soham...”, in RAIL, number 1948, page 43:

The qualities characteristic of a hero, such as courage, bravery, fortitude, selflessness, etc.; the display of such qualities.

heroizëm

the qualities characteristic of a hero, the display of them


trope

Japanese: トロープ (torōpu)

Korean: 트로프 (teuropeu)

From Latin tropus, from Ancient Greek τρόπος (trópos, “a manner, style, turn, way; a trope or figure of speech; a mode in music; a mode or mood in logic”), related to τροπή (tropḗ, “solstice; trope; turn”) and τρέπειν (trépein, “to turn”); compare turn of phrase. The verb is derived from the noun.

der

You have to give director Colm McCarthy, a Scottish TV veteran making his feature film debut, and writer Mike Carey, adapting his own novel, credit for attempting the seemingly impossible task of doing something new with the zombie subgenre. And by blending it with the common YA [young adult] trope of a young female protagonist who leads the world into a new revolutionary era, they almost get there—largely thanks to newcomer [Sennia] Nanua, who presents her character's grappling with complex themes of identity and original sin with a childlike guilelessness.

2017 February 23, Katie Rife, “The Girl With All The Gifts tries to put a fresh spin on overripe zombie clichés”, in The A.V. Club:

They have completely supported the Russians diplomatically, they’ve abstained in key votes at the United Nations, they’ve absolutely cynically repeated all the Russian tropes, particularly in places like Africa and Latin America – [by]^([sic]) blaming Nato and all of this stuff.

2023 July 20, Helen Davidson, quoting Richard Moore, “China complicit in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, says MI6 chief”, in The Guardian, →ISSN:

Contrary to the familiar trope that regulation kills innovation, Harding argues that in fact the political, moral and legal clarity provided by the Warnock commission spurred investment and economic growth.

2024 May 11, John Thornhill, “More than human?”, in FT Weekend, Life & Arts, page 8:

(art, literature) Something recurring across a genre or type of art or literature; a motif.

троп

art, literature: something recurring across a genre or type of art or literature

Is not the trope of muſic, to avoid or ſlide from the cloſe or cadence, common with the trope of rhetoric, of deceiving expectation? Is not the delight of the quavering upon a ſtop in muſic, the ſame with the playing of light upon the water?

1765, Francis Bacon, “The Second Book of Francis Bacon: Of the Proficience and Advancement of Learning, Divine and Human”, in The Works of Francis Bacon, Baron of Verulam, Viscount St. Alban, and Lord High Chancellor of England. In Five Volumes, volume I, London: Printed for A[ndrew] Millar, in the Strand, →OCLC, page 53:

If the antiphon comes to an end with the “Praeparatio” trope, a musical difficulty is presented by the trope’s cadence. Although the antiphon is in the E-plagal mode and the first three trope elements cadence on E, this trope cadences on G, a rare cadence tone in this mode.

1983, John G. Johnstone, “Beyond a Chant: ‘Tui sunt caeli’ and Its Tropes”, in Studies in the History of Music, volumes 1 (Music and Language), New York, N.Y.: Broude Brothers, →ISBN, pages 24–37; reprinted in Alejandro Enrique Planchart, editor, Embellishing the Liturgy: Tropes and Polyphony, Abingdon, Oxon., New York, N.Y.: Routledge, 2016, →ISBN, page 138:

A short cadence at the end of the melody in some early music.

troop

music: short cadence at the end of the melody

The eighty six-note segments were originally tabulated by Hauer and are the basis of his twelve-tone system. Each of [Josef Matthias] Hauer's tropes consists of two hexachords of mutually exclusive content, so that each pair of hexachords includes all twelve tones of the semitonal scale. Only eight hexachords may be associated in this way with their own transpositions. These generate the eight tropes illustrated in examples 141 and 128. Each of the remaining seventy-two hexachords must be paired with a dissimilar hexachord in order to form a trope.

1963, George Perle, “Simultaneity”, in Serial Composition and Atonality: An Introduction to the Music of Schoenberg, Berg, and Webern, Berkeley, Los Angeles, Calif.: University of California Press, →OCLC, page 120:

twelve-tone technique
twelve-tone technique

A pair of complementary hexachords in twelve-tone technique.

The Torah was chanted in a loud and strong voice so that all could hear. This cantillation of the Torah—trope—is shown by musical notation which serves grammatical and exegetical functions, ta'amay hamikra or ta'amay n'ginah. They put down in a final form an oral tradition that had been maintained for centuries. The Ashkenazim today have six systems of cantillation, each reflective of the texts and time of chanting. For example, on Tishah B'av the tunes are sad and doleful; on Purim the trope resembles a speedy narrative; the readings of Yamim Nora'im are quite majestic, and so on.

1985, Steven M. Brown, “The Languages of Prayer”, in Stephen Garfinkel, editor, Higher and Higher: Making Jewish Prayer Part of Us, Department of Youth Activities, United Synagogue of America, →OCLC, section 3 (The Language of Music), page 45:

The trope does not appear on the handwritten Torah scroll, but the assignment of notes for each word was fixed long ago and is accepted by Jewish communities around the world; the trope now appears in nearly every Jewish printed Bible. […] The symbols that signify the trope for the Hebrew text were introduced at the end of the 10th century of the Common Era.

2006, Sara E. Karesh, Mitchell M. Hurvitz, “trope”, in Encyclopedia of Judaism (Encyclopedia of World Religions), New York, N.Y.: Facts On File, Infobase Publishing, →ISBN, page 526, column 1:

(Judaism) A cantillation pattern, or one of the marks that represents it.

troop

music, Judaism: cantillation pattern or mark


trope

en-verb

trope (third-person singular simple present tropes, present participle troping, simple past and past participle troped)

tropes (present singular third-person)
troping (participle present)
troped (participle past)
troped (past)

"So clomb this first grand Thief into God's Fold" (4.192), [John] Milton writes, thus troping Satan's transgression as neither deception, seduction, nor disobedience, though he presents it in those terms elsewhere, but rather as robbery.

1999, Heather Dubrow, “'A Doubtfull Sense of Things': Thievery in The Faerie Queene 6.10 and 6.11”, in Patrick Cheney, Lauren Silberman, editors, Worldmaking Spenser: Explorations in the Early Modern Age (Studies in the English Renaissance), Lexington, Ky.: University Press of Kentucky, →ISBN, page 204:

It suggests that the "masculine" (or exaggeratedly masculine) style of Death in the Afternoon [by Ernest Hemingway] is not a formal or immanent attribute of the text but must be "engendered" through acts of interpretation. And it suggests that what was at stake in this "engendering" was nothing less than the preservation of powerful forms of authentic masculinity in the face of a work that, puzzlingly, seemed to trope the very notions of masculinity and modernism.

2002, Thomas Strychacz, “'The Sort of Thing You Should Not Admit': Ernest Hemingway's Aesthetic of Emotional Restraint”, in Milette Shamir, Jennifer Travis, editors, Boy's Don't Cry?: Rethinking Narratives of Masculinity and Emotion in the U.S., New York, N.Y.: Columbia University Press, →ISBN, page 151:

(transitive) Senses relating chiefly to art or literature.

To represent something figuratively or metaphorically, especially as a literary motif.


love triangle

/ˈlʌv ˌtɹaɪ.æŋɡəl/

La Battaglia di Legnano is a patriotic melodrama with a love triangle theme included.

1961 December 12, The Times, p.5 col. F:

By placing Max and Onno in a love triangle with Ada, Mr. Mulisch achieves an emotional depth that recalls Francois Truffaut's classic film “Jules and Jim.”

1997 January 5, Jack Miles, “On a Mission From God”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:

A situation in which two suitors vie or compete for the love of the same person.

liefdesdriehoek

situation in which two people vie for the love of a third


Chronos

Learned borrowing from Ancient Greek Χρόνος (Khrónos).

lbor

(Greek mythology) The personification of time.


Father Christmas

en-proper noun

Father Christmas (plural Father Christmases or Father Christmasses or Fathers Christmas)

Father Christmases (plural)
Father Christmasses (plural)
Fathers Christmas (plural)

The old men who had moustaches came with their breath frozen on them, and looked like so many old Father Christmasses: although all seemed poor and were indifferently clad, they almost all looked in good health and spirits.

1879 May, “Famine Relief. Welcome Words from Shan-si in a letter from Mr. James.”, in J[ames] Hudson Taylor, editor, China’s Millions, number 47, London: Morgan and Scott, […], page 63, column 2:

Again Donna Maria’s anger was interrupted by the rising of the curtain; or, rather, diverted from Carlo’s décadent æsthetics to the extreme badness of the mise en scène, to rows of Father Christmasses and ladies in grey waterproofs, who bellowed and gesticulated as unhappy shades at the gates of hell, and the chains of thick thighed and tight waisted furies who capered about in the rose-coloured Bengal light.

1889 June, Vernon Lee [pseudonym; Violet Paget], “Orpheus in Rome: Irrelevant Talks on the Use of the Beautiful”, in The Contemporary Review, volume LV, London: Isbister and Company […], section I, page 833:

The five Father Christmases walked slowly on, oblivious alike of the children who gaped at them and the man-hunt that was taking place under their noses.

1939, Nicholas Blake [pseudonym; Cecil Day-Lewis], The Smiler with the Knife, Harper & Row, page 199:

‘Yeah, I’ve seen those things they think are gnomes,’ said Ron, bent double with his head in a peony bush. ‘Like fat little Father Christmases with fishing rods …’

1998 July 2, J. K. Rowling [pseudonym; Joanne Rowling], “The Burrow”, in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (Harry Potter; 2), London: Bloomsbury Publishing, →ISBN:

At the beginning of the 1990s, therefore, Bardo moved to the current establishment, and was finally able to house his Father Christmases in the style they deserve.

2003, Piers Letcher, Eccentric France: The Bradt Guide to Mad, Magical and Marvellous France, Bradt Travel Guides; The Globe Pequot Press, →ISBN, page 207:

At Christmas, also in 2004, members processed as Fathers Christmas, employing the slogan ‘Put the fathers back into Christmas’.

2007, Duncan Watts, Pressure Groups (Politics Study Guides), Edinburgh University Press, →ISBN, page 122:

After the confrontation with the fictitious peer’s solution process, namely actually drawing rectangles around the Fathers Christmas’ irregular shapes, in Phase 4, another nine of the remaining 22 students (five 12–13- and four 15–16-year olds^([sic])) exchanged their initial linear answer for the correct nonlinear one.

2007, Dirk De Bock, Wim Van Dooren, Dirk Janssens, Lieven Verschaffel, The Illusion of Linearity: From Analysis to Improvement, Springer, →ISBN, page 103:

I was paid £1.92 an hour to wear a pink tutu and entertain the children waiting to see the two Father Christmases (one on either side of the grotto) as the increasingly irate families inched their way past the hour wait markers.

2011, Clare Hemmings, “Crossings”, in Kathy Davis, Mary Evans, editors, Transatlantic Conversations: Feminism as Travelling Theory, Routledge, published 2016, →ISBN, part I (Becoming a Feminist in a Transatlantic Context), page 29:

The smiling carol singers and the laughing Father Christmasses on the television seemed to make my misery more acute.

2016, Bryony Gordon, “I think I might be dying”, in Mad Girl, London: Headline Publishing Group, →ISBN, page 20:

In 1836, English artist Robert Seymour illustrated Thomas K. Hervey’s Book of Christmas with a couple of boozy, wild-haired Fathers Christmas that set the tone for the next fifty years in which the London newspapers were more likely to emphasize the good father’s drinking than anything else.

2020, Tom A. Jerman, Santa Claus Worldwide: A History of St. Nicholas and Other Holiday Gift-Bringers, McFarland & Company, →ISBN, pages 166–167:

In 1958, it was reported that for "the fourth year in succession, staff of four South London stations have combined to decorate the booking hall at Peckham Rye station". They installed a nativity scene, models of Father Christmas, and a sleigh driven by huskies, and Christmas trees were placed around the station.

2023 December 27, David Turner, “Silent lines...”, in RAIL, number 999, page 29:

(folklore) A mythical figure said to bring presents to people (especially children) at Christmas time.


catastrophe

en-noun

catastrophe (countable and uncountable, plural catastrophes)

From Ancient Greek καταστροφή (katastrophḗ), from καταστρέφω (katastréphō, “I overturn”), from κατά (katá, “down, against”) + στρέφω (stréphō, “I turn”).

Pat : he comes like the Cataſtrophe of the old Comedie : my Cue is villanous Melancholly, with a ſighe like Tom o’ Bedlam.

c. 1603–1606, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of King Lear”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene ii], page 286, column 2:

(narratology) The dramatic event that initiates the resolution of the plot; the dénouement.

catàstrofe

Ancient Greek tragedies: the solution of the plot


diegesis

Ancient Greek διήγησις (diḗgēsis, “narration”), from διηγέομαι (diēgéomai, “I narrate”)

uder

A novel like Sterne′s Tristram Shandy, however, simply embeds a number of different diegeses on the play-within-a-play model.

1985, Bill Nichols, Movies and Methods: An Anthology, page 504:

The standard distinction between mimesis and diegesis is usually referred to as that between showing and telling, between iconic and indexical signs on the one hand and symbolic signs on the other, between drama and recitation.

1991, Christopher Collins, The Poetics of the Mind's Eye: Literature and the Psychology of Imagination, page 4:

Extradiegetic music is a matter of pure convention. It constitutes an exception within Hollywood classical cinema, in which everything is to belong to diegesis in order to elaborate a fictive, realistic universe.

2004, Sarah Hatchuel, Shakespeare: From Stage to Screen, page 89:

(narratology) A narration or recitation.


climax

en-noun

climax (countable and uncountable, plural climaxes or (rare) climaces)

climaxes (plural)
climaces (plural rare)

From Latin clīmax, from Ancient Greek κλῖμαξ (klîmax, “ladder, staircase, [rhetorical] climax”), from κλίνω (klínō, “I lean, slant”).

bor

As a trafficker in climaxes and thrills and characterization and wonderful dialogue and suspense and confrontations, I had outlined the Dresden story many times.

1969 March 31, Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., chapter 1, in Slaughterhouse-Five […] (A Seymour Lawrence Book), New York, N.Y.: Delacorte Press, →OCLC, page 4:

(narratology) The culmination of a narrative's rising action, the turning point.

кулминация

turning point in a plot or dramatic action


open sesame

Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves
Antoine Galland
One Thousand and One Nights

From its use in Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves, translating French Sésame, ouvre-toi in Antoine Galland's version of the Ali Baba story in the One Thousand and One Nights, possibly based on an oral Arabic source.
Not, as some have purported, a corruption of Open, says me!.


hamartia

en-noun

hamartia (usually uncountable, plural hamartias)

/ˌhæˌmɑɹˈtiː.ə/

/ˌhɑːˌmɑɹˈtiː.ə/

From Ancient Greek ἁμαρτία (hamartía, “tragic failure, sinful nature”), from the verb ἁμαρτάνω (hamartánō, “to miss the mark”).

der

Creon's main hamartia was his excessive pride.

Understanding hamartia as “ignorance of the injurious act,” Lacan distinguishes Greek tragedy from the Renaissance version on the basis that the latter supplants hamartia with the hero's privileged knowledge.

2006, David Ratmoko, On Spectrality: Fantasies of Redemption in the Western Canon, Peter Lang, →ISBN, page 71:

The plot and the tragic figure at its center, destroyed through an act of hamartia, should be tailored to the production of pity and fear. Oedipus is not so much a person as he is a hamartia delivery system, a moving, empty center within the motions of the play, who through his vulnerability to hamartia and its disastrous consequences reveals the pitiable and the fearful to the audience.

2008, Daniel Greenspan, The Passion of Infinity: Kierkegaard, Aristotle and the Rebirth of Tragedy, Walter de Gruyter, →ISBN, page 81:

But ever since the concept of "hamartia" recurred through Aristotle's Poetics, in an attempt to describe man's ingrained iniquity, our impulse has been to identify a telling defect in those brought suddenly and dramatically low.

2014 October 21, Oliver Brown, “Oscar Pistorius jailed for five years […] ”, in The Daily Telegraph (Sport):

(Greek drama) The tragic flaw of the protagonist in a literary tragedy.


Columbia

From Columbus + -ia, the Latinized name of the European explorer, Christopher Columbus. Piecewise doublet of Colombia.

census-designated place
census-designated place

A census-designated place in Tuolumne County, California.

Several places in the United States.
A town in Tolland County, Connecticut.

Several places in the United States.
A town in Herkimer County, New York.

Tuscarawas County
Tuscarawas County#English

An unincorporated community in Tuscarawas County, Ohio.

An unincorporated community in Fluvanna County, Virginia.


cliffhanger

From cliff + hanger, evoking the image of someone left hanging from a cliff, thereby having an uncertain fate.
The term "cliffhanger" is considered to have originated with the serialised version of Thomas Hardy's "A Pair of Blue Eyes", published in Tinsley's Magazine in the 1870s, in which the character Henry Knight is left hanging off of a cliff. It was inspired by a real life story from his wife Emma's childhood, when she had to rescue one of her school friends from a similar position.

Back in the early 80s, the hit series Dallas kept the nation guessing with its season-ending cliffhanger "Who Shot J.R.?"

2007 July 2, Hilary Hylton, “Filming Texas in a Good Light”, in Time, archived from the original on 2009-03-15:

(narratology) An ending or stopping point calculated to leave a story unresolved, in order to create suspense.

cliffhanger

(narratology) an ending or stopping point

This presidential election is such a cliffhanger. Will it be the rising star Dmitry "Obamovich" Medvedev? Or the veteran Gennady "McCainovich" Zyuganov?

February 28 2008, Timothy Garton Ash, “Russia has run rings round the west”, in Guardian, retrieved 2009-02-02:

(by extension) An outcome which is awaited with keen anticipation, especially one which is delayed for a period of time or which is not known until the last minute.


John Bull

In spite of these promptings to reflection, ignorance of his neighbours is the character of the typical John Bull. His is a domineering nature, steady in fight, imperious to command, but neither curious nor quick about the life of others.

1887, Robert Louis Stevenson, “The Foreigner At Home”, in Memories and Portraits, New York: Charles Scribner, page 3:

Thatched cottages, manors, old mills, venerable churches and wooded lanes personify a John Bull fancy, neatly tucked into gentle hill folds.

2005, David W. Moore, The Other British Isles, →ISBN, page 183:

Next door to all that noble intention stood a bluff old John Bull of a hotel, Warners, now a pub and backpackers, and next to that, until 1993, a cinema, the last of several that had sprung up around the Square as temples of modernity.

2015, Fiona Farrell, The Villa at the Edge of the Empire, →ISBN, page 52:

(by extension) Something or someone that is stereotypically English.


Johnny Reb

From the sense of Johnny as a placeholder name for any man and reb, US slang for a Confederate citizen or soldier.

Confederate States of America
Confederate States of America

(historical, colloquial) Synonym of Confederate: a citizen of the Confederate States of America, particularly a Confederate soldier.


Johnny Reb

When Lincoln heard the news about the fall,
All the folks thought he'd throw a great vict'ry ball,
But he asked the band to play the song "Dixie"
For you, Johnny Reb, and all that you believe.

Confederate States of America
Confederate States of America#English

(figurative) Synonym of Confederate States of America.


villainy

en-noun

villainy (countable and uncountable, plural villainies)

From Middle English vileinie, vileynye, from Anglo-Norman vilenie, from Old French vilanie.

Mos Eisley spaceport- you will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be cautious.

1977, Star Wars, spoken by Obi-Wan Kenobi (Alec Guinness):

(uncountable) Evil or wicked character or behaviour.

(uncountable, obsolete) Ill-treatment, indignity, degrading or shameful treatment of someone.

(uncountable, obsolete) The state of being a villein or serf, and by extension servitude or low estate in life.

(uncountable, obsolete) Boorishness, rudeness, bad cultivation or manners.


conscience

conscience (countable and uncountable, plural consciences)

From Middle English conscience, from Old French conscience, from Latin conscientia (“knowledge within oneself”), from consciens, present participle of conscire (“to know, to be conscious (of wrong)”), from com- (“together”) + scire (“to know”).

der

(chiefly fiction, narratology) A personification of the moral sense of right and wrong, usually in the form of a person, a being or merely a voice that gives moral lessons and advices.


superhero

From super- + hero. First attested in 1917.

Hobbes: Super heroes wear snow pants?
Stupendous Man: When there's snow out, they do!

1990 February 13, Bill Watterson, Calvin & Hobbes (comic):

Any fictional crime-fighting character, often with supernatural powers or equipment, in popular children's and fantasy literature; a fictional hero who does great things.

супергеро́й

a fictional crime-fighting character with superpowers

The power is out but you're watching TV? You must be a superhero.

Thanks for driving out here and towing me out of the ditch. You're a superhero!

Did you know your community has many invisible superheroes? Each day they perform hundreds of amazing feats that make the community a better place in which to live.

1991, Boys' Life, volume 81, number 1, page 42:

(by extension) A particularly renowned real-world hero, or one who has seemingly impossible abilities.


poetic justice

/pəʊˌɛtɪk ˈd͡ʒʌstɪs/

From poetic + justice, a variant of poetical justice, coined by the English literary critic Thomas Rymer (c. 1643 – 1713) in the work The Tragedies of the Last Age Consider’d and Examin’d (1678): see the quotation.

coinage

For though historical Juſtice might reſt there; yet poetical Juſtice could not be ſo content. It vvould require that the ſatisfaction be compleat and full, e're the Malefactor goes off the Stage, and nothing left to God Almighty, and another VVorld.

[1678, Thomas Rymer, “The Tragedy of Rollo Duke of Normandy”, in The Tragedies of the Last Age Consider’d and Examin‘d […], London: […] Richard Tonson […], →OCLC, page 26:

Poetic Juſtice, vvith her lifted ſcale; / VVhere in nice balance, truth vvith gold ſhe vveighs, / And ſolid pudding againſt empty praiſe.

1728, [Alexander Pope], “Book the First”, in The Dunciad. An Heroic Poem. […], Dublin, London: […] A. Dodd, →OCLC, page 3, lines 40–42:

[T]he great object [of a comedy] is to cauſe a hearty laugh, in the accompliſhment of vvhich, the rules of the drama and the exerciſe of reaſon are often held in defiance; at the ſame time that poetic juſtice is carefully adminiſtered, and the vices of human nature are held up to merited execration.

1798 December, “Theatre. [Review of Laugh When You Can by Frederic Reynolds.]”, in The Universal Magazine of Knowledge and Pleasure: […], volume CIII, London: […] W. Bent, […], →OCLC, page 424:

[W]e cannot expect, nor does poetic justice allow, that a man shall act contary to his own nature through any force of will.

1894, Charles W. Hodell, “Shakespeare’s Opening Scenes as Striking the Key-note of Dramatic Action and Motive”, in Charlotte Porter, Helen A[rchibald] Clarke, editors, Poet Lore: A Magazine of Letters, volume VI, numbers 6–7, [Philadelphia, Pa.: Poet-Lore Co.]; New York, N.Y.: AMS Reprint Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 345:

Literary history, not to mention countless Grade B movies and television serials, teaches us that poetic justice is a standard formula for popular entertainment. […] Since very few people learn their morality from the theater, the enduring appeal of poetic justice must come from the fact that it satisfies needs that go much deeper than simple moral improvement. We can begin to get an insight into these needs by recognizing that poetic justice is a conscious or unconscious imitation of ideal justice.

1969, O[sborne] B[ennett] Hardison [Jr.], “Three Types of Renaissance Catharsis”, in Renaissance Drama, volume 2 (New Series), Evanston, Ill.: Northwestern University Press, →ISSN, →JSTOR, →OCLC, section II, page 9; republished in Arthur F. Kinney, editor, Poetics and Praxis, Understanding and Imagination: The Collected Essays of O. B. Hardison Jr., Athens, Ga., London: University of Georgia Press, 1997, →ISBN, part 2 (Poetics), page 83:

poetical justice
poetical justice#English

(narratology) Synonym of poetical justice (“the idea that in a literary work such as a poem, virtue should be rewarded and vice punished”)


Joe Bloggs

(Australia) A fictitious name used in legal documents for an unknown or anonymous male person.


Uncle Sam

/ˌʌŋkl̩ ˈsæm/

/ˌʌŋkəl ˈsæm/

From uncle + Sam (diminutive of the male name Samuel), probably based on the initialism U.S. of the United States. While folk etymology suggests that the term was named after Samuel Wilson (1766–1854), a meat packer from Troy, New York, who supplied the United States Army with canned meat during the War of 1812 between the United States and the United Kingdom, the Oxford English Dictionary notes there is no evidence that this is the case.

compound

Uncle Sam needs brave men and women to enlist in the Army.

(colloquial, originally US) A personification of the United States federal government or (rare) citizens.

James Montgomery Flagg
Oxford English Dictionary
Samuel Wilson
United States Army
War of 1812

اَلْعَمّ سَام

personification of the United States federal government or citizens


Joe Sixpack

(Internet slang) Somebody without particular expertise or interest in computers or the Internet; a nontechie.


anagnorisis

en-noun

anagnorisis (countable and uncountable, plural anagnorises)

Learned borrowing from Ancient Greek ἀναγνώρισις (anagnṓrisis), from ἀναγνωρίζειν (anagnōrízein, “to recognise, discover”).

lbor

His heroines never have a true anagnorisis because the moral fault is never in themselves, only in outside conspirators.

The moment in the plot of a drama in which the hero makes a discovery that explains previously unexplained events or situations; a denouement.

anagnorisis

moment in the plot when a character makes a critical discovery


top banana

He was hilarious, and remained the top banana on the tour for years.

(idiomatic, dated) The principal comedian in a vaudeville or burlesque show.


deathtrap

A plot device where a villain in a story puts a hero in an elaborate dangerous situation for the purposes of attempting a sadistic murder.


Althea

From Althaia or Althaea of Greek mythology, from Ancient Greek Ἀλθαία (Althaía).


Death

Death can be seen on a tarot card.

7 And when hee had opened the fourth seale, I heard the voice of the fourth beast say, Come and see.
8 And I looked, and behold, a pale horse, & his name that sate on him was Death, and hell followed with him: and power was giuen vnto them, ouer the fourth part of the earth to kill with sword, & with hunger, and with death, and with the beastes of the earth.

1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Revelation 6:7–8:

Oh cold, cold, rigid, dreadful Death, set up thine altar here, and dress it with such terrors as thou hast at thy command: for this is thy dominion!

1843 December 19, Charles Dickens, “Stave Four. The Last of the Spirits.”, in A Christmas Carol. In Prose. Being a Ghost Story of Christmas, London: Chapman & Hall, […], →OCLC, page 137:

He had drunk more than was fit for him, and he was singing some light song, when he saw approaching, as he said, the pale horse mentioned in the Revelation, with Death seated as the rider.

1902, John Buchan, The Outgoing of the Tide:

The personification of death, often a skeleton with a scythe, and one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse.


Tom

→ Tokelauan: Toma

From Middle English Thomme. Hypocorism of Thomas.

Poor Tom's a-cold.

c. 1603–1606, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of King Lear”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene iv]:

"Good,—that's a whack. What's your name?"
"Becky Thatcher. What's yours? Oh, I know. It's Thomas Sawyer."
"That's the name they lick me by. I'm Tom when I'm good. You call me Tom, will you?"

1876, Mark Twain [pseudonym; Samuel Langhorne Clemens], chapter VI, in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Hartford, Conn.: The American Publishing Company, →OCLC, page 70:

What I'm worrying about is what Tom says when he starts talking."
"Uncle Tom?"
"I wish there was something else you could call him except 'Uncle Tom'," said Aunt Dahlia a little testily. "Every time you do it, I expect to see him turn black and start playing the banjo."

1934, P. G. Wodehouse, Right Ho, Jeeves:

"We're not sure - we were expecting a girl for some reason. But we're thinking of something simple like Tom."
"Thomas?"
"No, just Tom."

2008, David Park, The Truth Commissioner, →ISBN, page 366:

A diminutive of the male given name Thomas, also used as a formal male given name.


jump the shark

en-verb

jump the shark (third-person singular simple present jumps the shark, present participle jumping the shark, simple past and past participle jumped the shark)

jumps the shark (present singular third-person)
jumping the shark (participle present)
jumped the shark (participle past)
jumped the shark (past)

From "Hollywood (Part 3)", a 1977 episode during the fifth season of the American television series Happy Days, in which the character Fonzie jumped over a shark on waterskis. The expression argues that it was at this point that the show bore no similarity to its original form.

2004, Ronn Owens, Voice of Reason: Why the Left and Right Are Wrong, John Wiley & Sons, published 2004, →ISBN, page 212:
From that point on, Dallas was never the same. It hit its peak. It lost credibility. It jumped the shark.

2010 September 16, Michael Hewitt, “The Watcher: Which new TV shows will take off?”, in Orange County Register:
Returning show everyone will say has jumped the shark: "House."


unobtainium

en-noun

unobtainium (countable and uncountable, plural unobtainiums)

From unobtain(able) + -ium (suffix typical of names of atomic elements), modelled after uranium and titanium.

suffix

Coordinate term: adamantium

Thus the invention of high temperature fuels will enable us to consider cores which are radiation cooled; such cores would be surrounded by large tanks (cooled by water) which in turn would be penetrated by beam holes. The beam holes themselves would probably have to be made of "unobtanium". (This "unobtanium" is a word coined at Atomics International to describe the material needed to make reactor projects feasible.) In between the radiation cooled reactors and the water cooled reactors is a regime suitable for liquid metal (including boiling liquid) cooled reactors. Once again "unobtanium" is needed.

1962, Charles N. Kelber, “Research Reactors”, in Earl W. Phelan, editor, Current Trends in Nuclear Power: A Symposium Sponsored by the University of Arizona in Cooperation with Argonne National Laboratory: Tucson, Arizona, February 26 – March 12, 1962, Argonne, Ill.: Argonne National Laboratory, →OCLC, page 17, column 2:

In order to illustrate some of the features of data processing under ideal conditions, a set of simulated data was generated and is presented in the last four columns of Table II. The hypothetical material is called Unobtainium.

[1978 September, Lynn C. Rogers, Ahid D. Nashif, “Computerized Processing and Empirical Processing of Viscoelastic Material Property Data and Preliminary Constrained Layer Damping Treatment Design”, in The Shock and Vibration Bulletin (Bulletin; 48, part 2 (Isolation and Damping, Impact, Blast)), Washington, D.C.: The Shock and Vibration Information Center, Naval Research Laboratory, →OCLC, page 26, column 2:

The names of materials presently used in aerospace applications are familiar: magnesium, aluminum, titanium, and so on. Propulsion scientists call the ideal material for turbine engines "Unobtainium," because it does not exist.

As early as 1969, during the initial Phase A studies, Lockheed had taken the initiative in proposing a two-stage fully-reusable design with both stages built of aluminum and using silica tiles for thermal protection. [...] Though that company indeed was in the forefront in developing such tiles, they were items for laboratory research. A design that specified their use had no more intrinsic credibility than one that proposed to use the miracle metals Unobtanium and Wishalloy.

1999, T[homas] A. Heppenheimer, “A Shuttle to Fit the Budget”, in The Space Shuttle Decision: NASA’s Search for a Reusable Space Vehicle (The NASA History Series; NASA SP-4221), Washington, D.C.: Office of Policy and Plans, NASA History Office, National Aeronautics and Space Administration, →OCLC, page 331:

This is not a Tom Tomorrow Bike, made of NASA unobtainiums and employing warp drives that have yet to be invented. It could be built as soon as the production technology is put on the line and powered-up, because all the vehicle technology is proven, off-the-shelf stuff.

2002 February, Kevin Cameron, “Supercharged: It’s Good to B-King”, in Cycle World, volume 41, number 2, New York, N.Y.: Hachette Filipacchi Magazines, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 38, column 2:

A fictional material or component which, if it existed, would enable one to easily solve a hard problem.

難得素

fictional component or material which would enable one to easily solve a hard problem


Britannia

Learned borrowing from Latin Britannia. Doublet of Britain and Brittany.

Rhondda Cynon Taf
Rhondda Cynon Taf#English

A suburb in Cymmer community, Rhondda Cynon Taf county borough, Wales (OS grid ref ST0390).


God

→ Pohnpeian: Koht

Etymology tree
Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰew-
Proto-Indo-European *-tós
Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰutós
Proto-Germanic *gudą
Proto-West Germanic *god
Old English god
Middle English god
Middle English God
English God
Derived from Middle English God. See god.

etymon

God sent Jesus to earth to be the King of the Jews; that is, the one to tell them what they should do. […] I will tell you why God let Jesus die upon the cross.

1899, The Sunday School Journal, page 378:

The first deity of various theistic religions, and the only deity in the Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.

(Trinitarian Christianity) God the Father as distinguished from Jesus Christ, God the Son.


God

God, is this because of the "I don't love you anymore" T-shirt I bought? It was a joke!

Admiral Anderson: God... feels like years since I just sat down.

2012, BioWare, Mass Effect 3 (Science Fiction), Redwood City: Electronic Arts, →OCLC, PC, scene: Citadel (Priority: Earth):

Short for oh God: expressing annoyance or frustration.


continuity

en-noun

continuity (countable and uncountable, plural continuities)

Borrowed from Middle French continuité, from Latin continuitas, equivalent to continue + -ity.

In “Treehouse Of Horror” episodes, the rules aren’t just different—they don’t even exist. If writers want Homer to kill Flanders or for a segment to end with a marriage between a woman and a giant ape, they can do so without worrying about continuity or consistency or fans griping that the gang is behaving out of character.

2012 April 29, Nathan Rabin, “TV: Review: THE SIMPSONS (CLASSIC): “Treehouse of Horror III” (season 4, episode 5; originally aired 10/29/1992)”, in (Please provide the book title or journal name):

(narratology) A narrative device in episodic fiction where previous and/or future events in a series of stories are accounted for in present stories.


anticlimax

anticlimax (countable and uncountable, plural anticlimaxes)

A failed or reverse climax, particularly:

(narratology) An unsatisfying resolution to a narrative, usually owing to a deus ex machina or similarly trivial resolution of the main conflict.


hey presto

(British) Used by stage magicians, when performing a magic trick.


second banana

He grew disenchanted with playing second banana and never getting credit for the laughter.

(idiomatic) A comedian who plays a secondary or supporting role, especially as straight man and traditionally in vaudeville or burlesque theatre.


elemental

Those who have escaped the dark and terrible aspects of life will find my brutality, my flash of rage in our final tragedy, easy enough to blame; for they know what is wrong as well as any, but not what is possible to tortured men. But those who have been under the shadow, who have gone down at last to elemental things, will have a wider charity.

1898, H.G. Wells, The War of the Worlds, London: William Heinemann, page 219:

The pervasive emptiness and stultifying summer heat were only minor deterrents when compared with the more elemental consideration that all the banking and commercial institutions were based elsewhere, chiefly in Philadelphia and New York.

2000, Joseph J. Ellis, Founding Brothers, New York: Vintage Books, pages 79–80:


Davy Jones's locker

There has been much speculation about the origin of this term, but none has been substantiated. See more at Davy Jones' Locker on Wikipedia.

"Damn my eyes," says he, "they are gone to Davy Jones's locker."
NOTE: Partridge erroneously refers to this as from the journal of Richard rather than Nicholas Cresswell.

1774, Nicholas Cresswell, The Journal of Nicholas Cresswell, 1774-7:

... are discovered singing a melancholy duet, bewailing the loss of an honest tar, whom they suppose (to use the burthen of the song) "is in Davy Jones's locker."

1781 August, Isaac Kimber, Edward Kimber, “The Summer Theatre”, in The London Magazine, or, Gentleman's Monthly Intelligencer, volume 50, page 360:

(nautical, idiomatic) The bottom of the ocean, seen as a grave for sailors and the resting-place of anything that goes overboard and is lost.

Davy Jones' Locker#History
en:Davy Jones's Locker

Davy Jones' locker at the Google Books Ngram Viewer


Azrael

From Latin Azrahel, from Ancient Greek Ἀζαραήλ (Azaraḗl), from Biblical Hebrew עֲזַרְאֵל (ʿăzarʾēl), possibly via Aramaic (compare Classical Syriac ܥܲܙܪܵܐܹܝܠ (ʿazrāʾēl)).

The angel of death in Catholic and Orthodox Christianity, and in Islam.


angel of death

مَلَك الْمَوْت

personification of death in fiction and in art

死神 (しにがみ, shinigami, literally “death kami, death spirit”)

A personification of death in fiction, art, mythology, or religion.

An angel which attends to death, collecting souls at death, ending life at the appointed time of death.

An angel in Abrahamic scripture or eschatology that attends to death.

Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse
Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse

Death, one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.

(translations, of Japanese) A shinigami.


narratology

narratology (countable and uncountable, plural narratologies)


prolepsis

prolepsis (countable and uncountable, plural prolepses)

From Latin prolepsis, from Ancient Greek πρόληψις (prólēpsis, “preconception, anticipation”), from προλαμβάνω (prolambánō, “take beforehand, anticipate”).

der

[…] [Edmund] Plovvden being of the Romiſh perſvvaſion, ſome Setters trapanned him (pardon the prolepſis) to hear Maſſe: But aftervvards Plovvden underſtanding, that the pretender to Officiate vvas no Prieſt, but a meer Lay-man (on deſigne to make a diſcovering) Oh! The caſe is altered quoth Plovvden: No Priest, no Maſſe.

a. 1662 (date written), Thomas Fuller, “Shrop-shire”, in The History of the Worthies of England, London: […] J[ohn] G[rismond,] W[illiam] L[eybourne] and W[illiam] G[odbid], published 1662, →OCLC, page 3:

(narratology) The practice of placing information about the ending of a story near the beginning, as a literary device.


plot twist

It was daring of Lena Dunham, the show’s writer and creator, to introduce this particular plot twist. Assisted suicide is one of the subjects that American television shows steadily avoid.

2014 March 27, Robin Marantz Henig, “Fictional Plotlines and Real Assisted Suicide”, in The Atlantic:

A change in the direction or expected outcome of the plot of a film, novel, or other narrative work.


Billy no mates

(British, slang) A person who has few or no friends.


comic relief

The sequence where Sam carves off Jorah’s infected tissue in secret, stopping every few moments to shush his patient, is presented as comic relief why? Jorah reels back into a diagonal close-up whimpering like a dog. Yellow pus oozes to get those good gross-out laughs. Is the substance of this operation funny to anyone on its face?

2017 July 23, Brandon Nowalk, “The great game begins with a bang on Game Of Thrones (newbies)”, in The Onion AV Club:

(narratology) The inclusion of a humorous character or scene or witty dialogue in an otherwise serious work, often to relieve tension.


time bomb

Even so, they managed to morph the recent European parliamentary elections into a time bomb and plant it under their country’s own future.

2014 June 6, Françoise Fressoz, “France’s Ticking Time Bomb”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:

Someone must explain to Sunak about the time bomb ticking beneath his £1,000 loafers.

2023 May 31, Nigel Harris, “Comment: GBR now! We have no Plan B”, in RAIL, number 984, page 3:

The pandemic preparation timebomb detonated to devastating effect; a number of other timebombs are on the shortest of fuses. The government has now reached a state of perfect vicious cycle, when the only thing worse than the things it does are all the things it didn’t get round to doing.

2023 June 30, Marina Hyde, “The tide is coming in fast on Rishi Sunak – and it’s full of sewage”, in The Guardian:

(figuratively) A situation that threatens to have disastrous consequences at some future time.


Davy Jones

Uncertain. See more at Davy Jones' Locker on Wikipedia.

The pirates made him walk the plank, sent him down to Davy Jones.

He got so frightened about his plaguy soul, that he shrinked and sheered away from whales, for fear of after-claps, in case he got stove and went to Davy Jones.

1851 November 14, Herman Melville, chapter 18, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC:


series original

en-noun

series original (plural series originals)

(narratology) The first published narrative in a series of works; a narrative from which later narratives are written after. It serves as the chronological core of the series.


Joe Average

Write the instructions so that any Joe Average can understand them.

(idiomatic) A hypothetical average or generic individual; the common man (or person, by extension).


John Q. Public

Even careful safety precautions in the factory do not make it a good place for John Q. Public to wander unattended.

(idiomatic) A generic individual; some hypothetical average or ordinary citizen.

Jan Novák

a generic individual; some hypothetical average or ordinary citizen


threequel

When last seen, the “Poseidon” had been blown into small pieces. With any luck, this means Mr. Allen can’t possibly make a threequel.

1979 May 25, Janet Maslin, “Inside a Floating Hulk”, in The New York Times:

On the contrary, last summer saw two jocular parodies of 1970’s blaxploitation films: the minor hit Undercover Brother and Beyonce Knowles’s portrayal of Foxxy Cleopatra, a character in the Austin Powers “threequel.”

1999 June 30, Katherine Anne Ackley, Perspectives on Contemporary Issues, Readings Across the Disciplines, Harcourt, fourth edition, Thomson Wadsworth (2006), page 267

This may be the year of the threequel, but not all the franchises will be successful, predicts Mr. Gray.

2007 January 5, Stephen Humphries, “At theaters in 2007, the year of the 'threequel'”, in The Christian Science Monitor:

THE biggest threequels to date have included some great films.
The third part of the original Star Wars trilogy, Return of the Jedi (1983), then Episode III: Revenge of the Sith (2005) were huge hits.

2007 April 16, Brian Mciver, “Return of the Threequel”, in The Daily Record:

(narratology) The chronologically third part of any series of works, especially a movie trilogy.


backstory

From back- (prefix meaning ‘in, into, or towards the past’) + story.

prefix

What’s the backstory of our new colleague?

These backstories cast the characters' behavior in a new light: of course Gertrude would promptly marry the man who saved her from abuse; of course Ophelia would be desperate and indiscreet in seeking Hamlet's love.

2004 January 15, Kelly Kleiman, “Her side of the story [review of Ophelia by Bryony Lavery, performed by the Camenae Ensemble Theatre Company]”, in Chicago Reader, Chicago, Ill.: Chicago Reader, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2022-05-26:

Inexplicably, and at great risk to the integrity of the movie, the filmmakers have burdened him with a psychological back story pulled out of a folder in some studio filing cabinet. Why does [Willy] Wonka spend his days confecting sweets?

2005 July 15, A[nthony] O[liver] Scott, “Looking for the candy, finding a back story [review of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005)]”, in The New York Times, New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2023-10-08:

Agent Lyla: Enough back story! / Dr. Doofenshmirtz: Actually, that's not, uh … that's not really a back story, it's just expositional flashback. It doesn't, uh, have any childhood trauma, it's doesn't really inform who he is, it's not … it's just flashback. There's a difference. It's subtle, but there's a difference.

2013 March 1, Kaz [i.e., Kazimieras Gediminas Prapuolenis], Kim Roberson, Aliki Theofilopoulos Grafft, John Mathot, “Sidetracked”, in Phineas and Ferb, season 4, episode 7, spoken by Dr. Heinz Doofenshmirtz (Dan Povenmire):

Prince Harry may yet turn out to be the crown’s best insurance policy. By marrying Meghan Markle, he is linking royalty with a 21st-century celebrity who has a backstory that many people in Britain can identify with.

2017 December 27, “Editorial: The Guardian view on Prince Harry: the monarchy’s best insurance policy”, in Katharine Viner, editor, The Guardian, London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2023-04-29:

The previous experiences and life of a person, specifically (narratology, especially in film, television) a character in a dramatic work.


flashback

→ German: Flashback

→ Spanish: flashback

→ Norwegian: flashback

→ Portuguese: flashback

(authorship) A dramatic device in which an earlier event is inserted into the normal chronological flow of a narrative.

salt enrere

a dramatic device in which an earlier event is inserted into the normal chronological flow of a narrative


peripeteia

en-noun

peripeteia (countable and uncountable, plural peripeteias)

/pɛɹɪpɪˈtɪə/

/pɛɹɪpɪˈtaɪə/

/pɛɹɪpɪˈtiə/

/pɛɹɪpɪˈteɪə/

From Late Latin peripetia, and its source Ancient Greek περιπέτεια (peripéteia), from περιπίπτω (peripíptō, “to change suddenly”), from περί (perí, “round, around, about”) + the stem of πίπτω (píptō, “to fall”).

(drama) A sudden reversal of fortune as a plot point in Classical tragedy.

перипетия

a reversal of fortune; a sudden change in circumstances


lampshade

en-verb

lampshade (third-person singular simple present lampshades, present participle lampshading, simple past and past participle lampshaded)

lampshades (present singular third-person)
lampshading (participle present)
lampshaded (participle past)
lampshaded (past)

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-lampshade.wav

From lamp + shade. The verb sense comes from the idea of making something more conspicuous by hanging a lampshade on it.

Only one short bit of humor is endearing, lampshading the ridiculousness of an eye-mask being able to conceal a superhero's identity.

2011 June 21, Corinne Gaston, “Adapted comic book flick has the ring, but no power”, in Daily Trojan:

Rewriting a whole character is one heck of a chore but the editor/writer must either bite the bullet or indulge in some clever trickery like lampshading.

2013, Heide Goody, Iain Grant, How to Write a Collaborative Novel, →ISBN:

Just as the push by writers in season 4 to make Homer stupider (a trend so established it was lampshaded in "The 138th Episode Spectacular") created some of the best episodes before eventually birthing an unlikable buffoon unaffectionately called "Jerkass Homer", so too is it less the episode itself as much as what it represented.

2019 April 30, Alex Leadbeater, “Did "Marge Be Not Proud" Start The Simpsons' Decline In Season 7?”, in Screen Rant:

(narratology, fandom slang) To intentionally call attention to the improbable, incongruent, or clichéd nature of an element or situation featured in a work of fiction within the work itself.


storyline

From story + line. The climate science usage is defined in the IPCC WG III AR5 report (2014).

That film had a wonderful storyline, but the poor acting let it down.


hocus-pocus

/ˌhəʊkəs ˈpəʊkəs/

LL-Q1860 (eng)-I learned some phrases-hocus-pocus.wav

Archbishop of Canterbury
Jesus
John Tillotson
Robert Ibbitson

The interjection and noun are derived from made-up pseudo-Latin magical incantations used by conjurers (formerly called “jugglers”) such as “hocus pocus, tontus talontus, vade celeriter jubeo” (with a particular 17th-century conjurer adopting Hocus Pocus as his name) and “hax pax max Deus adimax”. The suggestion that the term is a corruption of words from the Roman Catholic liturgy of the Eucharist, “hoc est enim corpus meum” (“this is my [i.e., Jesus’s] body”), was made in a sermon by the Archbishop of Canterbury, John Tillotson (1630–1694), but is not generally accepted.
The verb is derived from the noun.

nb...

That is, the Lord doth Avenge the Blood of the Innocent upon the Inhabitants of the Earth: This Book is Profitable to bee Read by All Judges of Assizes, before They Passe the Sentence of Condemnation against Poor People, who are Accused for Witchcraft; it is also Profitable for All Sorts of People to Read who Desire Knowledge.

dwelling in Simithfield neer Hosier Lane End

Containing Fifty-four Sermons and Discourses, on Several Occasions. Together with the Rule of Faith. Being All that were Published by His Grace Himself, and Now Collected into One Volume. To which is Added, an Alphabetical Table of the Principal Matters.

A phrase used (by a stage magician, etc.) as a magical incantation to bring about some change: abracadabra, hey presto.


fabula

From Latin fabula (“story”). Doublet of fable.

(narratology) A series of events forming the basis of a story or narrative.


femme fatale

en-noun

femme fatale (plural femmes fatales or femme fatales)

femmes fatales (plural)
femme fatales (plural)

Unadapted borrowing from French femme fatale (literally “deadly woman”).

ubor

Cause everybody knows (She's a femme fatale) / The things she does to please (She's a femme fatale)

1967, Lou Reed (lyrics and music), “Femme Fatale”, in The Velvet Underground & Nico, performed by The Velvet Underground:

An attractive and seductive but ultimately dangerous woman.


heroics

/hɪˈɹəʊ.ɪks/

Of if we have an elderly person who is unconscious and not responding, we discuss using heroics with the family, and they often say no heroics.

1976, Ronald E. Alexander, Lawrence P. Wilkins, Medical-legal dilemmas in the care of the critically ill:

Her daughters argue that no heroics should be used to prolong her life.

1988, American College of Legal Medicine, Legal Medicine: Legal Dynamics of Medical Encounters, page 122:

No Heroics. Do not use respirators, ventilators or administer medication other than those medications necessary to prevent infection, provide comfort or alleviate pain.

1998, George Watson, Emily Watson, The Calling: A Journey on the Path of Parent Care, page 29:

(US, medicine) Emergency intervention to save a patient's life.


diegetic

/ˌdaɪəˈd͡ʒɛtɪk/

Learned borrowing from Ancient Greek διηγητικός (diēgētikós).


reported speech

If we were to change "Fred says, 'I will do the housework'" into reported speech it would become "Fred said that he would do the housework."

(grammar, narratology) A form of speech used to express what another has said, often involving a change in tense.

ситләтелгән телмәр

a form of speech used to express what another has said


pay-off

At the current monthly payment level, it'll take 32 more months to reach pay-off.

A payment in full; the state of having been paid in full.


metafiction

en-noun

metafiction (usually uncountable, plural metafictions)

From meta- + fiction, coined in 1970 by William H. Gass

Julian Barnes's Flaubert's Parrot (1984) and Peter Ackroyd's Hawksmoor and Chatterton may be described as accomplished examples of historiographic metafiction, the kind of self-conscious, heavily parodic and experimental historical […]

1999, Susana Onega Jaén, Metafiction and Myth in the Novels of Peter Ackroyd, Camden House, →ISBN, page 1:

In the previous chapter, I presented a heuristic explanation of the development of metafiction. In this chapter, I turn to some texts written before the 1980s to demonstrate that the binary between realism and metafiction is not fixed.

2010, Evan Mwangi, Africa Writes Back to Self: Metafiction, Gender, Sexuality, SUNY Press, →ISBN, page 65:

A form of self-referential literature concerned with the art and devices of fiction itself.


Father Time

Marry, sir, by a rule as plain as the plain bald pate of Father Time himself.

c. 1594 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Comedie of Errors”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene ii]:

A personification of time as an old man, usually carrying an hourglass.