"elegant variation" meaning in English

See elegant variation in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Noun

Forms: elegant variations [plural]
Etymology: Introduced by H. W. Fowler and F. G. Fowler in The King's English (1906). Head templates: {{en-noun|~}} elegant variation (countable and uncountable, plural elegant variations)
  1. (journalism, literature) The use of synonyms to avoid repetition (regarded as a stylistic fault when done excessively). Wikipedia link: Francis George Fowler, H. W. Fowler, The King's English Tags: countable, uncountable Synonyms: inelegant variation Related terms: monologophobia, synonymomania
    Sense id: en-elegant_variation-en-noun-X~p2c0Q6 Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header, Pages with 1 entry, Pages with entries, Literature, Mass media Topics: journalism, literature, media, publishing

Inflected forms

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  "etymology_text": "Introduced by H. W. Fowler and F. G. Fowler in The King's English (1906).",
  "forms": [
    {
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      "tags": [
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  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
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          "parents": [],
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          "name": "Literature",
          "orig": "en:Literature",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
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          "name": "Mass media",
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          "ref": "1999, Peter M. Tiersma, Legal Language, University of Chicago Press, →ISBN, page 131:",
          "text": "A closely related rule for encoding legal texts is the same meaning, same form principle. We saw previously that this rule requires lawyers to avoid elegant variation. Instead, they should consistently use one word if they mean the same thing.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
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        "(journalism, literature) The use of synonyms to avoid repetition (regarded as a stylistic fault when done excessively)."
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      "related": [
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          "word": "monologophobia"
        },
        {
          "word": "synonymomania"
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  "word": "elegant variation"
}
{
  "etymology_text": "Introduced by H. W. Fowler and F. G. Fowler in The King's English (1906).",
  "forms": [
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      "tags": [
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  "head_templates": [
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  "lang_code": "en",
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          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "The use of synonyms to avoid repetition (regarded as a stylistic fault when done excessively)."
      ],
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      ],
      "synonyms": [
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      ],
      "tags": [
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}

Download raw JSONL data for elegant variation meaning in English (1.7kB)


This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2025-06-16 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2025-06-01 using wiktextract (074e7de and f1c2b61). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

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