dateline

Other bits of furniture include the dateline, which says where a journalist is reporting from – historically with the date of dispatch, eg “Buenos Aires, 1 March.”

2023 January 31, Elisabeth Ribbans, “The perils of using journalist jargon outside the newsroom”, in The Guardian:

(journalism) A line at the beginning of a document (such as a newspaper article) stating the place of origin and typically the date, and often written in capital letters.

dátlíne

a line at the beginning of a document stating the date and place of origin


boustrophedon

PIE word
 *gʷṓws
Borrowed from Ancient Greek βουστροφηδόν (boustrophēdón, literally “turning like an ox”), from βοῦς (boûs, “ox”) + στροφή (strophḗ, “turning”) + -ηδόν (-ēdón, adverbial suffix).

bor+

βουστροφηδόν

af

(historical, calligraphy, of writing) In a fashion such that the reading direction changes from right-to-left to left-to-right with each new line.


boustrophedon

bor+

βουστροφηδόν

(historical, calligraphy, of writing) Written from right-to-left and left-to-right on alternate lines.


boustrophedon

en-noun

boustrophedon (countable and uncountable, plural boustrophedons)

boustrophedons (plural)
bustrophedon (alternative)

bor+

βουστροφηδόν

The number of Attic boustrophedon texts is fairly small; most of those just cited have been brought down by the experts to a date close to 550 B.C., a date to which several texts of more than one line inscribed left to right may also be assigned (cf. pp.56—57 infra), besides the four-line retrograde sep. mon. of Pediarchus cited in the previous section (cf. p.52 supra). Stone texts only really become numerous in Attica about 550, and by this time it is clear that left-to-right writing is just as common as boustrophedon, and may have been so even earlier.[…]After 540 boustrophedon was certainly unusual.

1980, Leslie Threatte, The Grammar of Attic Inscriptions: Phonology, page 55:

(Venetic apparently had both kinds of boustrophedon, either flipping the face of the characters when switching direction or else inverting them (Lejeune, 1974, pages 180-181).)

2000, Richard Sproat, A Computational Theory of Writing Systems, page 61:

He draws a sharp distinction between true boustrophedon, which has the tops of the runes pointed in the same direction, but with a change in the direction of writing with each line, and false boustrophedon, which changes from upright to inverted runes with each line, but the lines themselves are each written in the same direction.

2002, Elmer H. Antonsen, Runes and Germanic Linguistics, page 132:

(historical, calligraphy, of writing) Writing that is right-to-left and left-to-right on alternate lines.

بُطْرُفَة

writing that is alternately right-to-left and left-to-right


refer

From Middle English referren, from Old French referer, from Latin referre. The noun (used in journalism) is from the verb. Doublet of relate. See also infer, collate and confer, delate and defer, as well as prelate and prefer among others.

A refer on page 1 of the Tuesday, Aug. 4, 2015, edition of The Herald-News contained incorrect information about the story “Neighbors at odds over Joliet liquor license” that appeared on Page 4 of the same edition.

2015 August 5, “Corrections”, in The Herald-News, Joliet, Illinois: Shaw Media, via Issuu, page 2:

Looking at the refers on page 2, it's obvious that May became something of an accidental women's issue.

2017 May 2, Amanda May Aruani, “Letter from the Editor”, in The Arts Paper, New Haven, Connecticut: The Arts Council of Greater New Haven, via Issuu, page 3:

The paper of Sept. 11 was not without its alarms. On Page One, an ominous “refer” (pronounced reefer) to an article inside the paper: Palestinian snipers had killed two Israelis, bringing a retaliatory shelling by Israeli tanks. On A3: A suicide bomber had killed two police officers in Istanbul.

2021 September 10, Ralph Blumenthal, “A Time Capsule in Two Front Pages”, in The New York Times, New York City:

(journalism) A blurb on the front page of a newspaper issue or section that refers the reader to the full story inside the issue or section by listing its slug or headline and its page number.


gonzo

en-adj

gonzo (comparative more gonzo, superlative most gonzo)

more gonzo (comparative)
most gonzo (superlative)

Coined in 1971 by Boston Globe editor Bill Cardoso. Of uncertain origin; OED proposes Italian gonzo (“dolt”) and / or Spanish ganso (“dolt, goose”). The etymology supplied by Cardoso himself (French gonzeaux) is spurious.

I ask Hunter to explain ... Just what is Gonzo Journalism? ... “Gonzo all started with Bill Cardosa ^([sic]), ... after I wrote the Kentucky Derby piece for Scanlan's ... the first time I realized you could write different. And ... I got this note from Cardosa saying, ‘That was pure gonzo journalism!’ ... Some Boston word for weird, bizarre.”

1972, Richard Pollack, chapter VI, in Stop the Presses, I Want to Get Off!:

(journalism) Using an unconventional, exaggerated, and highly subjective style, often when the reporter takes part in the events of the story.


lyric

lyric (comparative more lyric, superlative most lyric)

more lyric (comparative)
most lyric (superlative)
lyrick (alternative obsolete)

From French lyrique, or its source, Latin lyricus, from Ancient Greek λυρικός (lurikós), from λύρα (lúra, “lyre”). Its English equivalent would be lyre + -ic.
The original Greek sense of "lyric poetry"—"poetry accompanied by the lyre" i.e. "words set to music"—eventually led to its use as "lyrics", first attested in Stainer and Barrett's 1876 Dictionary of Musical Terms. Stainer and Barrett used the word as a singular substantive: "Lyric, poetry or blank verse intended to be set to music and sung". By the 1930s, the present use of the plurale tantum "lyrics" had begun; it has been standard since the 1950s for many writers. The singular form "lyric" is still used to mean the complete words to a song by authorities such as Alec Wilder, Robert Gottlieb, and Stephen Sondheim. However, the singular form is also commonly used to refer to a specific line (or phrase) within a song's lyrics.

(poetry) Of, or relating to a type of poetry (such as a sonnet or ode) that expresses subjective thoughts and feelings, often in a songlike style.


rhapsody

The noun is derived from Latin rhapsōdia (“part of an epic poem suitable for uninterrupted recitation”), from Koine Greek ῥαψῳδία (rhapsōidía, “part of an epic poem suitable for uninterrupted recitation; rigmarole”), Ancient Greek ῥαψῳδία (rhapsōidía, “composition or recitation of Epic poetry”), from ῥαψῳδός (rhapsōidós, “composer or performer of Epic poetry”) + -ῐ́ᾱ (-ĭ́ā, suffix forming feminine abstract nouns). Ῥαψῳδός (Rhapsōidós) is derived from ῥᾰ́πτω (rhắptō, “to sew”) (possibly from Proto-Indo-European *werb- (“to bend; to turn”)) + ᾠδή (ōidḗ, “ode; song”) (ultimately from Proto-Hellenic *awoidā́ (“song”)) + -ος (-os, suffix forming o-grade action nouns).
Sense 2.2 (“instrumental composition of irregular form”) probably developed from sense 2.1 (“exaggeratedly enthusiastic or exalted expression of feeling in speech or writing”), and both of these senses may have been influenced by rapture (“extreme excitement, happiness, or pleasure”), the latter being a quality associated with the senses. Sense 2.3 (“literary composition consisting of miscellaneous works”) is borrowed from Middle French rhapsodie (modern French rhapsodie), from Latin rhapsōdia: see above.
The verb is derived from the noun.
Cognates
* French rhapsodie (“instrumental composition of irregular form”)
* German Rhapsodie (“instrumental composition of irregular form”)

cog

(Ancient Greece, poetry, historical) An epic poem, or part of one, suitable for uninterrupted recitation.

狂想曲

ancient Greek epic poem, or part of one, suitable for uninterrupted recitation


stichomythia

en-noun

stichomythia (countable and uncountable, plural stichomythias)

/stɪkəˈmɪθɪə/

From Latin, from Ancient Greek στιχομυθία (stikhomuthía), from στίχος (stíkhos, “line of verse”) (see sticho-) + μῦθος (mûthos, “speech”).

The trial in the great hall under its high vaults, dusty sunlight shafting in, full of murmurers and growlers quietened by beadles and bailiffs, with howlers in the street held back with pikes, was by way of being a play without plot or exercise in what the Senecans term stichomythia.

1993, Anthony Burgess, A Dead Man In Deptford:

The stichomythias are just as necessary in Sophocles' tragedies as are his choruses.

2006, Olga Freidenberg, Image and Concept, page 297:

The two modes have different effects: while a rhesis allows the speaker to give an account of himself, attempt to persuade his hearers, or move freely across a range of emotions or types of argument, stichomythia is better suited to swift exchange of information through question and answer, though it can also be used for spicy polemic, aggressive interrogation, or accusation and defence.

2012, R. B. Rutherford, Greek Tragic Style: Form, Language and Interpretation, page 165:

(poetry) A technique in drama or poetry, in which alternating lines, or half-lines, are given to alternating characters, voices, or entities.


macron

From Ancient Greek μακρόν (makrón), neuter form of μακρός (makrós, “long”) (English macro-).

We say such words belong to a Long family, because of the long macron hat the vowels wear. Like the other twin o's, one hat is enough for both, for these twins are always found together.

1889, Rebecca S[mith] Pollard, A Complete Manual: Pollard’s Synthetic Method of Reading and Spelling. Designed to Accompany Synthetic Readers and Spellers, New York, N.Y.: American Book Company, →OCLC, page 75:

A macron is a mark placed above a long vowel to mark its quantity.

1974, Floyd L. Moreland, Rita M. Fleischer, Latin: An Intensive Course, University of California Press, page 13:

All vowels are pronounced short unless marked with a ¯ (macron) over them. So observe different vowel length of ‘i ’ in, e.g., fīlia, etc. It may be helpful, but is not essential, to mark macra in your exercises.

1986, Peter V. Jones, Keith C. Sidwell, “Introduction”, in Reading Latin, volumes 1 (Grammar, Vocabulary and Exercises), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 2, general note 1:

(orthography) A short, straight, horizontal diacritical mark (◌̄) placed over a letter, usually to indicate that the pronunciation of a vowel is long.


background

en-verb

background (third-person singular simple present backgrounds, present participle backgrounding, simple past and past participle backgrounded)

backgrounds (present singular third-person)
backgrounding (participle present)
backgrounded (participle past)
backgrounded (past)
back ground (alternative obsolete)

(journalism) To gather and provide background information (on).


initial

From Middle French initial or directly from its Latin etymon initiālis (“of the beginning, incipient, initial”), from initium (“a going in, entrance, beginning”), from inire (“to go in, enter upon, begin”), from in (“in”) + ire (“to go”).

(typography, calligraphy) A distinguished initial letter of a chapter or section of a document.

caplletra

calligraphy: distinguished initial letter


stock character

en-noun

stock character (plural stock characters)

(writing, theater, film) Any fictional character drawn from some stereotype who is instantly recognizable.

ամպլուա

fictional character based on a recognizable stereotype


taut

en-adj

taut (comparative tauter, superlative tautest)

tauter (comparative)
tautest (superlative)

The adjective is derived from Middle English taught [and other forms], Early Middle English tohte, towehte (“strained, stretched; distended; tight; firm”), probably from tough, touth, touʒth, toʒt (“powerful, strong; fierce, violent; not tender, tough; hardy, resilient; steadfast, stout; difficult to do or endure”) and possibly influenced by togen, towen, past participle of ten (“to extend, stretch out; to drag, haul, pull, tow, tug”) (modern English tee (“(obsolete) to draw, lead; to draw away; to go, proceed”)), or directly from its etymon Old English tēon (“to drag, draw, pull”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *dewk- (“to draw, pull”)) The word may be related to thight (“(dialectal) compact, dense; close-fitting, tight”) and tight; and is cognate with Scots tacht, taght (“taut”).
The verb is probably derived from the adjective.

nb...

toft, toght, tohte, toth, tought, touht, tout, touȝt, touʒt, towght, towht, towt, towte, toȝt, toʒte

der

If he curbs his swing a little and gets something crisper and tauter in his methods he may yet be very good.

1921 March 19, Bernard Darwin, “Golf on the Forest”, in Peter Anderson Graham, editor, Country Life, volume XLIX, number 1263, London: George Newnes […], →OCLC, page 321, column 2:

The superbly crafted suspense thriller that director Jonathan Demme has made from Thomas Harris's taut best-selling novel The Silence of the Lambs slams you like a sudden blast of bone-chilling, pulse-pounding terror.

1991 February 14, Peter Travers, “The Silence of the Lambs [film review]”, in Rolling Stone, New York, N.Y.: Wenner Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2017-12-05:

Quick action and dialogue create a taut story, although it is illustration that shapes the characters.

1997, “Minty: A Story of a Young Harriet Tubman (written by Alan Schroeder, 1996) [book review]”, in Linda R. Andres, editor, Children’s Literature Review, volume 43, Detroit, Mich.: Gale Research, →ISBN, page 174, column 2; quoted in Milton C. Sernett, “‘Minty’”, in Harriet Tubman: Myth, Memory and History, Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 2007, →ISBN, page 35:

Guitarist Jade Puget and vocalist Davey Havok have distilled AFI's strengths (a ferocious, post-hardcore rhythmic backbone; goth-tinctured, post-punky guitars; and Havok's desperate, dramatic croon) into 14 taut, hook-driven songs.

2017 January 20, Annie Zaleski, “AFI Sounds Refreshed and Rejuvenated on Its 10th Album, AFI (The Blood Album)”, in The A.V. Club, archived from the original on 2019-11-03:

(of music, writing, etc.) Containing only relevant parts; brief and controlled.

napínavý

containing only relevant parts; brief and controlled


dek

Deliberate misspelling of deck, to distinguish the word as not belonging in the story.

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Naomi Persephone Amethyst (NaomiAmethyst)-deque.wav

(journalism, slang) The subhead of a news story.


mediasphere

(journalism) The collective ecology of the world's media, including newspapers, journals, television, radio, books, novels, advertising, press releases, publicity and the blogosphere; any and all media both broadcast and published.


ultraism

en-noun

ultraism (countable and uncountable, plural ultraisms)

The eight young signers of this “Ultra manifesto” could not have known at the time how accurate and prescient their declaration was. Spanish ultraism, born as a movement with that document, would be distinguished, ironically, by its indiscriminate and eclectic borrowings from the other European vanguard tendencies.

1981, Thorpe Running, Borges' Ultraist Movement and its Poets, Lathrup Village, Mich.: International Book Publishers, →ISBN, page 1:

(poetry) A Spanish poetic movement opposed to modernism.


huddle

From Middle English *hudelen, alteration (due to hudels, hidels (“hiding place”), see hiddle) of *huderen, hoderen (“to cover; press together; huddle”), a frequentative form of Middle English huden, hiden (“to hide”), equivalent to hide + -le and/or hide + -er. Compare Low German huderken (“to brood; coddle; nurse; lull children to sleep”).

cog

The post-PMQs huddle takes place just outside the press gallery, and all the journalists swarm first around the Prime Minister's press team[…]

2018, Ayesha Hazarika, Tom Hamilton, Punch and Judy Politics: An Insiders' Guide to Prime Minister's Questions:

A small group of individuals in very close proximity to one another.

(journalism) A session in which a group of journalists assemble in an informal, dense cluster to question a person of interest.


aubade

Princess Christina of the Netherlands
Rosalía de Castro

PIE word
 *albʰós
Borrowed from French aubade, from Old French albade, from Old Spanish albada (“musical or poetic composition to be performed in the morning”), from alba (“dawn”), from Vulgar Latin *alba (“dawn; sunrise”), from Latin albus (“bright, clear; white”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *albʰós (“white”).

beuregan

And there he lingered till the crowing cock, / The Alectryon of the farmyard and the flock, / Sang his aubade with lusty voice and clear, / To tell the sleeping world that dawn was near.

1873 August, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, “[I. Tales of a Wayside Inn.] The Student’s Tale. Emma and Eginhard.”, in Aftermath, Boston, Mass.: James R[ipley] Osgood and Company, late Ticknor & Fields, and Fields, Osgood, & Co., →OCLC, page 27:

Alladad Khan woke to the far crying of kampong cocks in the dark. That noise had been the farmyard aubade in the Punjab in his dream.

1956, Anthony Burgess, chapter 11, in Time for a Tiger (The Malayan Trilogy), London: William Heinemann, published 1968, →ISBN, page 155:

(music, poetry) A poem or song evoking or greeting the dawn or early morning.

(music, specifically) A morning love song, or a song of lovers parting in the morning.

aubade

morning love song; song of lovers parting in the morning


wrapping

From Middle English wrappinge, wrappynge, equivalent to wrap + -ing.

See also: autowrap, backwrap, line break, word wrap, and wraparound

(computing, writing) The breaking of a section of text into lines so that it will fit into the available width of a display area.


soliloquy

en-noun

soliloquy (countable and uncountable, plural soliloquies)

Augustine of Hippo
Hamlet
Soliloquiorum libri duo
To be, or not to be
William Shakespeare

1595–1605; From Late Latin sōliloquium in the title of St. Augustine's Soliloquiorum libri duo ("Two Books of Soliloquies"), from sōlus (“only, sole”) + loquor (“I speak”).

The feeling of Singleton's bosom grew heightened in its tone of melancholy, and a more passionate emphasis of thought broke forth in his half-muttered soliloquy:— ¶"How I remember as I look […]

1835, William Gilmore Simms, The Partisan, Harper, Chapter XI, page 135:

Here is a very over-simplified example, this time expressed in the form of a subjective soliloquy rather than a computer simulation.

1976, Richard Dawkins, The Selfish Gene, Kindle edition, OUP Oxford, published 2016, page 126:

(authorship) A speech or written discourse in this form.


doggerel

Probably from dog + -rel (“pejorative suffix”), akin to Dog Latin, late 14th c.

dogrel (alternative obsolete)
doggrel (alternative archaic)

True Wit has ſeen its best days long ago, / It ne're look'd up, ſince we were dipt in Show: / When Senſe in Dogrel Rimes and Clouds was loſt, / And Dulneſs flouriſh'd at the Actors coſt.

1677 (date written), John Dryden, “Prologue”, in The Kind Keeper; or, Mr. Limberham: A Comedy: […], London: […] R[ichard] Bentley, and M[ary] Magnes, […], published 1680, →OCLC:

(poetry) Of a crude or irregular construction.


doggerel

doggerel (countable and uncountable, plural doggerels)

doggerels (plural)
dogrel (alternative obsolete)
doggrel (alternative archaic)

Taffy drew a long breath into his manly bosom, and kept it there as he read this characteristic French doggerel (for so he chose to call this touching little symphony in ère and ra).

1894, George du Maurier, “Part Sixth”, in Trilby: A Novel, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, →OCLC, page 302:

As he marched he sang a bit of doggerel in a high and quavering voice: / "Sing a song 'a vic'try, / A pocketful 'a bullets, / Five an' twenty dead men / Baked in a—pie."

1895 October, Stephen Crane, chapter VIII, in The Red Badge of Courage: An Episode of the American Civil War, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC, page 86:

(poetry) A comic or humorous verse, usually irregular in measure.


tieback

(journalism) A newspaper rewrite or short synopsis of the information presented in the original story. in order to refresh the memories of readers who saw the old story and to update new readers.


refactor

en-verb

refactor (third-person singular simple present refactors, present participle refactoring, simple past and past participle refactored)

refactors (present singular third-person)
refactoring (participle present)
refactored (participle past)
refactored (past)

Two significant activities which to contribute to community projects, such as Wikipedia, are to refactor complicated articles into simpler ones, and to refactor duplicated content into reusable templates.

(writing) To rewrite existing text in order to improve its readability, reusability or structure without intentionally affecting its meaning. Similar to, but sometimes involving more extensive restructuring than, copy editing.


byline

bylines (plural)
by-line (alternative British)

Paste Magazine opted not to put a byline on its harsh review of Swift’s album, citing safety concerns for the writer.

2024 April 22, Matt Stevens, Shivani Gonzalez, “Taylor Swift Has Given Fans a Lot. Is It Finally Too Much?”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:

(journalism) A line at the head of a newspaper or magazine article carrying the writer's name.


byline

byline (third-person singular simple present bylines, present participle bylining, simple past and past participle bylined)

bylines (present singular third-person)
bylining (participle present)
bylined (participle past)
bylined (past)
by-line (alternative British)

Mitchell, Lange and Brus (2013) find that in a top international relations Journal^([sic])—ISQ—83 percent of men's citation are to research bylined by just men, while 57 percent of women's citations are to articles bylined by just men (table 2).

2020, Colin Elman, John Gerring, James Mahoney, editors, The Production of Knowledge: Enhancing Progress in Social Science, Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, footnote 34, page 416:

(journalism, transitive) To provide (an article) with a byline.


syllabary

/ˈsɪləˌbɛɹi/

From Neo-Latin syllabārium, from syllaba.

(orthography) A table or list of syllabic letters or syllables.

It shouldn't be hard to come up with a musical syllabary in which pitches code for vowels and timbres code for consonants.

(orthography) A writing system where each character represents a complete syllable.


nutgraf

nutgrafs (plural)
nut graf (alternative)
nut graph (alternative)
nutgraph (alternative)

/ˈnʌtˌɡɹɑːf/

(journalism, colloquial) The sentence or paragraph that summarizes a story.


coverage

en-noun

coverage (countable and uncountable, plural coverages)

Etymology tree
Proto-Indo-European *ḱe-?
Proto-Indo-European *ḱóm
Proto-Italic *kom
Old Latin com
Latin cum
Latin con-
Proto-Indo-European *h₁epi
Proto-Indo-European *h₂wer-
Proto-Indo-European *-yeti
Latin operiō
Latin cooperiō
Old French covrirbor.
Middle English coveren
English cover
Proto-Italic *-ātos
Latin -ātus
Proto-Italic *-kos
Latin -cus
Latin -icus
Latin -āticus
Latin -āticum
Old French -agebor.
Middle English -age
English -age
English coverage
From cover + -age. First attested in 1912. Compare Middle English coverage (“a charge for having or stall or booth at a fair”).

cog

Through services using the Elizabeth line were increased from November 6, but this did not attract significant media coverage - mainly because it has been an operational success, […].

2022 November 30, Industry Insider, “Autumn Statement boost”, in RAIL, number 971, page 84:

(journalism) The amount and type of attention given to an event or topic in news media or other media.

լուսաբանում

(journalism) the amount and type of attention given to an event or topic in news media


chancery

en-noun

chancery (countable and uncountable, plural chanceries)

/ˈt͡ʃɑːnsəɹɪ/

/ˈt͡ʃænsəɹɪ/

/ˈt͡ʃɑːnsəɹi/

From French chancellerie, from Late Latin cancellaria, from Latin cancellarius, from Latin cancellus (“lattice”) (English chancel), from Latin cancelli (“grating, bars”), from the lattice-work that separated a section of a church or court.
See related chancellor and chancellery, and the more distantly related incarcerate (“put behind bars”), from carcer (“prison”).
The adverbial form is an allusion to the condition of a person involved in the chancery court.


madrigal

/ˈmæd͡ɹɪɡəl/

From Italian madrigale, from Latin mātrīcālis.

(poetry) A short poem, often pastoral, and suitable to be set to music.


sidekick

From side + kick, which in the late 19th and early 20th century was a slang term for the front side pocket of a pair of trousers, known as the pocket safest from theft. Thus, by analogy, a "side-kick" was a person's closest companion.

So even though he had – no question – the best lines in Friends, he was never what he would have been in an earlier era: the sidekick.

2023 October 29, Zoe Williams, “‘An ironic, self-deprecating metrosexual’: how Matthew Perry captured the spirit of the age”, in The Guardian, →ISSN:

(authorship, figuratively) In literature, theatre, etc., a good foil of the protagonist, a character who helps emphasize the traits of the main character.


Guardian

(newspapers) A British daily national newspaper.


H

Coordinate term: Q (“quarter”)

We expect the amendment to enter into force in H2 2013.


Ionic

From Ancient Greek ἰωνικός (iōnikós, “related to Ionians”).

uder

(poetry) A four-syllable metrical unit of light-light-heavy-heavy (‿ ‿ — —) that occurs in Ancient Greek and Latin poetry.


Post

en-proper noun

Post (countable and uncountable, plural Posts)

(newspapers) A common name (often in combination) for a newspaper or periodical, such as The Washington Post or the New York Post.

bưu báo

common name for a newspaper or periodical


Sun

the Sun (canonical)
sonne (alternative obsolete)
sunne (alternative obsolete)
sun (alternative)

From Middle English sunne, from Old English sunna, sunne (“sun; the Sun”), from Proto-West Germanic *sunnā, from Proto-Germanic *sunnǭ, from the heteroclitic inanimate Proto-Indo-European *sh₂wén-, oblique form of *sóh₂wl̥ (“sun; the Sun”).
Cognate with Saterland Frisian Sunne, West Frisian sinne, Dutch zon, Old Dutch sunna, German Low German Sünn, Old Saxon sunna, German Sonne, Old High German sunna, Faroese sunna, Icelandic sunna, Gothic 𐍃𐌿𐌽𐌽𐍉 (sunnō). More at sun.

inh

(newspapers) An English tabloid newspaper.


Times

Mr. Campion seated himself in the client’s chair and crossed his long legs. His hat, his gloves and his folded Times newspaper he held upon his knee.

1963, Margery Allingham, “Off the Record”, in The China Governess: A Mystery, London: Chatto & Windus, →OCLC, page 73:

From there, the meme will slowly leak into more popular mainstream-right punditry, and then into the Republican Party, until Ted Cruz sweatily asks a judicial nominee if they “support the current thing” and the Times writes some stilted, breathless article about the meme as disinformation.

2022 May 9, Max Read, “What Is “The Current Thing”?”, in Slate:

(newspapers) A common name (often in combination) for a newspaper or periodical, especially The Times (published in the United Kingdom), but also The New York Times, The Times of India, Radio Times, etc.


Winter

en-noun

Winter (countable and uncountable, plural Winters)

(poetry) Alternative letter-case form of winter.


stop press

From stop the presses, US newspaper-printing jargon.

1989, Textual Introduction to The Anatomy of Melancholy, Robert Burton http://books.google.com/books?ie=UTF-8&hl=en&id=C64iQVqCm3MC&pg=RA1-PR51&lpg=RA1-PR51&sig=JpcrTaGG5EdPxJjr2U8VwuilsEw
Three of the errata corrections had already been made as stop-press corrections …

Faked Stop Press! announcements in newspapers. A valuable trick because it can always be claimed that the announcement was ‘hushed up’. It is also easy to fake the printing of the Stop Press.

2002, Russell Miller, Behind the Lines http://books.google.com/books?ie=UTF-8&hl=en&id=iAtuxaBlfRkC&pg=PA103&lpg=PA103&sig=erWM7_pq0H8pCDJnv5W4-5bxlv0

2005, Mary Norway, The Sinn Fein Rebellion As I Saw It, http://books.google.com/books?ie=UTF-8&hl=en&id=kdp6DLzb6KcC&pg=PA65&lpg=PA65&sig=TWkyRKxWPtmbwiGPh_BvuIQNwlA
Another lady thought she would drive a lesson home, so she said: “But you said it was a ‘Stop press,’ and you knew it was not.”
“It is, miss, but sure they hadn’t time to print the ‘stop press’ on it!!”
(“Stop press” is the latest news, usually printed on the back of the paper.)

STOP PRESS: As this issue of RAIL went to press, the RMT announced that it too would be taking strike action on the Tube on March 15

2023 March 8, “Tube drivers announce "first day of action"”, in RAIL, number 978, page 11:

(UK, journalism) The event or news article important enough to delay or interrupt the print, or require a reprint, of a publication, particularly of a newspaper edition.


elegant variation

elegant variation (countable and uncountable, plural elegant variations)

Introduced by H. W. Fowler and F. G. Fowler in The King's English (1906).

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.

1999, Peter M. Tiersma, Legal Language, University of Chicago Press, →ISBN, page 131:

(journalism, literature) The use of synonyms to avoid repetition (regarded as a stylistic fault when done excessively).

Francis George Fowler
H. W. Fowler
The King's English


kicker

Hammers are, in essence, reverse kickers. Instead of being set in smaller type like kickers, hammers are set in larger type than headlines.

1981, Harry W. Stonecipher, Edward C. Nicholls, Douglas A. Anderson, Electronic Age News Editing, page 104:

(journalism) Small text above a headline that indicates the topic of the story.

Dachzeile

journalism: Small text above a headline that indicates the topic of the story

(journalism) The last one or two paragraphs of a story.

lopetus

journalism: the last paragraph or two of a story

(journalism) Synonym of lead-in (“start of photo caption”).


volte-face

volte-faces (plural)
volte face (alternative)

LL-Q1860 (eng)-I learned some phrases-volte-face.wav

Shakespeare often used volte-faces in the rhyming couplets at the end of his sonnets.

(literature, chiefly poetry) A dramatic change in mood or tone.


graf

Phonetic respelling of clipping of paragraph.

Brooks lays out the crux of his case his case in his first three grafs of his article:

2010 January 27, Matt Taibbi, “Populism: Just Like Racism!”, in True/Slant, archived from the original on 2013-01-19:

This Wednesday story includes a graf on Reuters’ stance:

2025 February 13, Joshua Benton, “Trump wants news outlets to get on board with ‘Gulf of America’ — or else. Will they?”, in Nieman Journalism Lab, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Nieman Foundation for Journalism, retrieved 2025-02-13:


newscast

(broadcasting, journalism) A broadcast of the news; a news report that is transmitted over the air for television, radio, etc.


newscaster

Take Linda, a thirty-nine-year-old newscaster who relished her career but began to hear the alarm ringing on her biological clock.

1994, Rugh Winter, Bonnie Eaker-Weil, Adultery, the Forgivable Sin:

Yet, a few US newscasters will go on the air at 6 pm or later and say, "Moscow said tonight.["] ... A careful writer would make his script read, "Moscow said today. ..."

1997, Mervin Block, Writing Broadcast News: Shorter, Sharper, Stronger, →ISBN, page 154:

It is still considered embarrassing if people in authority like teachers or newscasters “shrub.”

2019 April 19, Alice Wairimu Nderitu, “Harro! I shrub because, really, I have no otherwise, do I?”, in The East African, archived from the original on 2023-04-16:

(broadcasting, journalism) One who delivers the news for broadcast on television, radio, etc; a newsreader.


Alcaic verse

(poetry) A Greek meter, supposedly invented by Alcaeus, consisting of combinations of spondee, iambs and dactyls.


supplement

From Latin supplementum (“that which is added to supply a shortage”), from supplere (“to provide something”).

der

Coordinate term: (journals) special issue

the literary supplement

"Mid-Lent, and the Enemy grins," remarked Selwyn as he started for church with Nina and the children. Austin, knee-deep in a dozen Sunday supplements, refused to stir; poor little Eileen was now convalescent from grippe, but still unsteady on her legs; her maid had taken the grippe, and now moaned all day: "Mon dieu! Mon dieu! Che fais mourir!"

1907 August, Robert W[illiam] Chambers, chapter IV, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC:

(journalism, scientific literature) An additional section of a newspaper devoted to a specific subject; an additional section of a journal issue, or an additional issue, for a similar purpose.


royalty

en-noun

royalty (countable and uncountable, plural royalties)

→ Danish: royalty

→ German: Royalty

→ Italian: royalty

→ Norwegian Bokmål: royalty

→ Norwegian Nynorsk: royalty

→ Portuguese: royalty

→ Swedish: royalty

From Middle English royaltee, roialtee, royalte, from Old French roialté, roiauté, realté (compare earlier Old French realted (“realm, kingdom”)), from Vulgar Latin *rēgālitās, from Latin rēgālis, equivalent to royal + -ty. Doublet of regality.

Until the total of advances in that contract has been earned out by royalties from any or all books in that contract, the author will not receive additional royalties.

2014, Richard Curtis, Mastering the Business of Writing:

(authorship) To make more money from a book than it cost to run an advertising campaign for it; to make enough in royalties to cover the advance a book received.


flimsy

flimsy (countable and uncountable, plural flimsies)

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Naomi Persephone Amethyst (NaomiAmethyst)-flimsy.wav

British Army
Crusader tank
Monadhliath Mountains
North African Campaign

The origin of the adjective is uncertain; it is possibly from flim(-flam) (“(noun) false information presented as true, misinformation, nonsense; poor attempt at deception, confidence trick, pretence; (adjective) frivolous, nonsensical; deceptive; fictitious”) or a metathesis of film (“thin layer of a substance; slender thread”) + -sy (suffix forming adjectives and nouns).
The noun and verb are derived from the noun. Noun sense 4 (“metal container”) refers to the fact that the containers often split along their seams and leaked.

affix

[page 31] Sub-editors are now hard at work cutting down "flimsy," ramming sheets of "copy" on files, endlessly conferring with perspiring foremen. […] [page 34] The last report from the late debate in the Commons has come in; the last paragraph of interesting news, dropped into the box by a stealthy penny-a-liner, has been eliminated from a mass of flimsy on its probation, and for the most part rejected; […]

1859, George Augustus Sala, “Five o’Clock a.m.—The Publication of the ‘Times’ Newspaper”, in Twice Round the Clock; or The Hours of the Day and Night in London. […], London: Houlston and Wright, […], →OCLC, pages 31 and 34:

(by extension) A document printed or typed on such paper.

(newspapers, uncountable) The text to be set into pages of magazines, newspapers, etc.; copy.


stanza

From Italian stanza, from Vulgar Latin *stantia (“standing, stopping-place”), from Latin stāns, stantis, from stō, stāre, from Proto-Italic *staēō, from Proto-Indo-European *sth₂éh₁yeti, stative verb from *steh₂- (whence English stand). Doublet of stance.

der

(poetry) A unit of a poem, written or printed as a paragraph; equivalent to a verse.


RFT

(newspapers) Initialism of Riverfront Times.


lede

A deliberate misspelling of lead, originally used in instructions given to printers to indicate which paragraphs constitute the lede, intended to avoid confusion with the word lead which may actually appear in the text of an article. Compare dek (“subhead”) (modified from deck) and hed (“headline”) (from head).

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

Readers usually see the lead picture and read its caption first, before reading the lede of the article, so the article lede should not be a repetition of the caption.

1979, J. W. Click, Russell N. Baird, Magazine Editing and Production, 2nd edition, Dubuque, Iowa: W[illiam] C. Brown, →ISBN, page 90:

"How can Mr. On-line Guy learn to be a journalist if he didn't go through what I went through?" they [newspaper journalists] ask. "I needed the city editor to tell me how to write a graceful sentence, and I was a year into the job before I could craft a decent lede?"

1999, Mike Godwin, “Who’s a Journalist?—II: Welcome the New Journalists on the Internet”, in Robert H. Giles, Robert W. Snyder, editors, What’s Next?: Problems & Prospects of Journalism, New Brunswick, N.J., London: Transaction Publishers, published 2001, →ISBN, page 46:

I was thrilled to be in possession of this nugget, which could probably take over the lede of my story. This essentially and truly implicated one of the most respected homicide detectives in Boston, all based on my initial tip.

2007 February, Brian McGrory, chapter 40, in Strangled, New York, N.Y.: Atria Books, →ISBN, page 314:

The lede (as we spell it) story in today's NYT [The New York Times] is all about their new poll showing that [John] McCain is hurting himself, not [Barack] Obama, with the attacks. […] If something's the lede in the NYT, it tends to get discussed on cable TV all day, etc.

2008 October 15, Michael Tomasky, “Michael Tomasky’s Blog: This Morning’s Stuff You Need to Know”, in The Guardian, London: Guardian News & Media, archived from the original on 2016-03-06:

Like all forms of writing, there's no hard and fast rule about what makes a great lede. A good lede changes depending on the story you're writing. […] Ledes vary wildly, but you'll start to notice patterns and, more importantly, what kinds of ledes you like and feel are effective.

2018, Branden Salas, “Reporting for Print Media”, in Basic Concept of Journalism, Waltham Abbey, Essex: Ed-Tech Press, published 2020, →ISBN, page 253:

Here are some different types of ledes: […] · Scenario ledes use narrative elements to describe a place of particular importance to the story. / · Narrative ledes begin at a chronological beginning. […] · First-person anecdotal ledes begin with a relevant anecdote that involves the writer. Service and celebrity pieces often begin with first-person ledes.

2019, Naveed Saleh, “Narrative: Beginnings, Middles, and Ends”, in The Writer’s Guide to Self-editing: Essential Tips for Online and Print Publishing, Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland & Company, →ISBN, part VII (Global Considerations), page 225:

(chiefly US, journalism) The introductory paragraph or paragraphs of a newspaper, or a news or other type of article; the lead or lead-in.

լիդ

introductory paragraph or paragraphs of a newspaper or other news article


impressionism

en-noun

impressionism (countable and uncountable, plural impressionisms)

(poetry) A style that used imagery and symbolism to portray the poet's impressions.


stringer

And he told a few stories about time he had spent in New York in the 1950s as a stringer for the Asahi newspapers… about meeting Diana Vreeland and Truman Capote and Judy Holiday.

1991, Douglas Coupland, “Enter Hyperspace”, in Generation X, New York: St. Martin's Press, →OCLC:

(journalism) A freelance correspondent not on the regular newspaper staff, especially one retained on a part-time basis to report on events in a particular place.


dead donkey

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

From the saying that no one ever sees a dead donkey, hence a rarity. This then became a stock example of a slow-news-day story, which was popularized by the title of the British sitcom Drop the Dead Donkey.

Swap these ages around to produce a 59-year-old father and a 45-year-old mother and what was previously a hot news story becomes a dead donkey.

1994, New Scientist, volume 141, numbers 1907–1912, page 3:

Those are the people who should have some protection from media excesses, even if only to gain some form of compensation for the damage sustained once the media has left and they, like the proverbial dead donkey, are dropped, their lives in tatters, because they were used by the media in an unsavoury ciruclation or viewing war.

1999, Council of Europe. Parliamentary Assembly, Official Report of Debates, volume 2, page 525:

When disaster strikes, the dead donkey does not get dropped, but merely occurs later on the television news.

2003, Peter Narváez, Of corpse: death and humor in folklore and popular culture, page 25:

(journalism) A news item of no real significance, usually of whimsical or sentimental nature, placed at the end of a news bulletin or in a newspaper as filler. A dead donkey can often be removed from the programme or publication if a more significant story needs extra time or space.


ghostwrite

en-verb

ghostwrite (third-person singular simple present ghostwrites, present participle ghostwriting, simple past ghostwrote, past participle ghostwritten)

ghostwrites (present singular third-person)
ghostwriting (participle present)
ghostwrote (past)
ghostwritten (participle past)
ghost-write (alternative)
ghost write (alternative)

Mariana would rather not ghostwrite for a living because she finds it a thankless task.

(authorship, intransitive) To write under the name of another (especially literary works).

The president has someone to ghostwrite his addresses.

(authorship, transitive) To author a literary work or speech in the place of another.


sound bite

sound bites (plural)
soundbite (alternative)

The dumbing down of America is most evident in the slow decay of substantive content in the enormously influential media, the 30-second sound bites (now down to 10 seconds or less), lowest common denominator programming, credulous presentations on pseudo-science and superstition, but especially a kind of celebration of ignorance.

1995, Carl Sagan, “Science and Hope”, in The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark, 1st edition, New York: Random House, →ISBN, pages 25–26:

(journalism, television) An extract from a speech or interview used as edited into a news or other broadcast; an interview clip, especially seen as particularly expressive or pithy.


streamer

From Middle English stremer, stremere, equivalent to stream + -er.

(journalism) A newspaper headline that runs along the top of a page.

koko sivun levyinen otsikko

newspaper headline that runs across the entire page


monologue

monologues (plural)
monolog (alternative US noun)

dialogue

antonym(s) of “a monopolizing utterance”

First attested in c. 1550. Borrowed from Middle French monologue, modeled on dialogue, ultimately from Byzantine Greek μονόλογος (monólogos, “soliloquy, monologue”).

der

(drama, authorship) A long speech by one person in a play; sometimes a soliloquy; other times spoken to other characters.


headline

The headline on today's newspaper reads "John Doe Wins Wood-Splitting Competition."

Say that you'll never, never, never, never need it
One headline, why believe it?
Everybody wants to rule the world

1985, Roland Orzabal, Ian Stanley, Chris Hughes, “Everybody Wants to Rule the World”, in Songs from the Big Chair, performed by Tears for Fears:

Risk is everywhere. From tabloid headlines insisting that coffee causes cancer (yesterday, of course, it cured it) to stern government warnings about alcohol and driving, the world is teeming with goblins. For each one there is a frighteningly precise measurement of just how likely it is to jump from the shadows and get you.

2013 June 22, “Snakes and ladders”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8841, page 76:

(journalism) The heading or title of a magazine or newspaper article.


exposition

en-noun

exposition (countable and uncountable, plural expositions)

From Middle English exposicioun, from Old French esposicion, from Latin expositiō, from expōnere (“to put forth”). The sense meaning "exhibition" is a later semantic loan from French exposition.

This essay has too much exposition in it.

My reviewer said she couldn't picture the setting for my story, so I'm improving the exposition.

(authorship) The act or process of declaring or describing something through either speech or writing, in nonfiction or in fiction; the portions and aspects of a piece of writing that exist mainly to describe or explain a set of things (such as, in fiction, the setting, characters and other non-plot elements).

I turned my research into an exposition on the traditional music of Borneo.

(authorship) An essay or speech in which any topic is discussed in detail.

বয়ান

(authorship) An opening section in fiction, in which background information about the characters, events or setting is conveyed.


sted

From Middle English sted, from Old English stede (“place, spot, locality”).

der

(This version CORRECTS Corrects title of movie to ‘Echoes of the Rainbow’ sted ‘Echoes of a Rainbow.’)

2010 February 22, “Hong Kong rejoices over Berlin film prize”, in Long Island Press, retrieved 2012-07-25:

Eds: CORRECTS name of city to 'Pass Christian' sted 'Port'. Moving on general news and financial services. AP Video.

2010 May 10, Vicki Smith, Holbrook Mohr, “Gulf Oil Spill: Unemployed Fishermen Struggling To Get By”, in Huffington Post, retrieved 2012-07-25:

(journalism, slang) short for instead of


AFP

When asked about the legal proceedings, Durov reportedly told the AFP that he “trusts the French justice” system but refused to elaborate on the case.

2024 December 7, Zoltan Vardai, “Telegram founder Pavel Durov questioned in Paris court for first time: Report”, in Cointelegraph:

(journalism) Initialism of Agence France-Presse.


run-in

en-adj

run-in (not generally comparable, comparative more run-in, superlative most run-in)

more run-in (comparative)
most run-in (superlative)

These headings are of the run-in type because a free-hanging style would just be a waste of column inches.

participial adjective
participial adjective

(participial adjective; editing, typography) (not comparable) Having been run in before or behind previous text.


in-line

An in-line mathematical formula does not have to be on a line of its own.

Parenthetical referencing is a citation style which uses in-line citations enclosed within parentheses.

This is an inline (e.g. mid-sentence) template for marking up text as a Wikipedia self-reference.

(writing) Inserted in the flow of a text.


sestet

From Italian sestetto, from sesto (“sixth”), Latin sextus, from sex (“six”).

(poetry) The last six lines of a sonnet, forming two stanzas of three lines each.


longueur

Borrowed from French longueur (literally “length”).

bor+

Most of the reasons given for its disappearance make sense: people are happier, busier; the work done by the anti-Freudian skeptics has finally taken hold of the popular imagination, so that people have no time for analytic longueurs and no patience with its mystifications.

1998 August 17, Adam Gopnik, “Man Goes To See a Doctor”, in The New Yorker:

He cultivated the aura, if not quite of the Anti-Christ, at least of an Anti-Sun King, discountenancing his uncle and shocking the dévots by preferring the intimacy and informality of a clique of drinking companions to the formal longueurs of the courtly round […].

2002, Colin Jones, The Great Nation, Penguin, published 2003, page 30:

[T]he reader can’t help feeling that a few judicious nips and tucks might have dispersed the longueurs that waft around the third quarter of the book.

2015 October 5, Michiko Kakutani, “Review: ‘City on Fire,’ Garth Risk Hallberg’s Novel of New York in the Bad Old Days”, in New York Times:

Claire Fontaine (who are actually a duo) have queered the phrase, lending its pungency and ambiguity to a biennale that I wish were nearly so succinct. There are longueurs. There are detours and incomprehensible delays.

2024 April 22, Adrian Searle, “Venice Biennale 2024 review – everything everywhere all at once”, in The Guardian, →ISSN:

(authorship) A lengthy passage in a dramatic or literary work, especially a dull or tedious one; a period of boredom.


spondee

spondees (plural)
spondeus (alternative archaic)

From Latin spondēus (“spondee”), from Ancient Greek σπονδεῖος (spondeîos, “associated with a libation”) from σπονδή (spondḗ, “libation”): spondees were often used in melodies sung at libations.

der

(poetry) A word or metrical foot of two syllables, either both long or both stressed.


doorstep

en-verb

doorstep (third-person singular simple present doorsteps, present participle doorstepping, simple past and past participle doorstepped)

doorsteps (present singular third-person)
doorstepping (participle present)
doorstepped (participle past)
doorstepped (past)

Throughout her time in journalism, she doorstepped politicians, the child of a politician, crime victims, armed robbers, murderers, suspected murderers...

1998, Emily O'Reilly, Veronica Guerin: The Life and Death of a Crime Reporter:

Surprisingly few people refused to talk, even those I doorstepped or telephoned out of the blue.

2006, Denis O'Hearn, Nothing But an Unfinished Song:

(transitive, journalism) To corner somebody for an unexpected interview.


mora

From Latin mora (“duration of time, delay”).

In the quantitative meters in Sanskrit a heavy syllable is considered to be equal to two morae and a light syllable equivalent to one mora.

1918, Elcanon Isaacs, “The Metrical Basis of Hebrew Poetry”, in The American Journal of Semitic Languages and Literatures, volume 35, page 22:

(poetry) A unit used to measure lines and stanzas of poetry.


ductus

Borrowed from Latin ductus (“leading, conducting”, noun). Doublet of duct and douit.

bor

The number of strokes that make up a written letter, and the direction, sequence and speed in which they are written (Compare graph; see also aspect.)

A subtle reduction of weight towards the middle of the stroke of the letter.


diacritical mark

en-noun

diacritical mark (plural diacritical marks)

(orthography, typography) A symbol in writing used with a letter to indicate a different pronunciation, stress, tone, or meaning.


acute accent

From Latin accentus (“accent”) acūtus (“sharp”), a calque of Ancient Greek προσῳδία (prosōidía, “accent”) ὀξύς (oxús, “sharp”).
Cognate to French accent aigu.

der

(orthography): A diacritical mark ( ´ ) that can be placed above a number of letters in many languages of the Latin, Greek and Cyrillic writing systems.


vox pop

The reporter got some vox pops in the city square to see what people thought of the country's new flag.

While the BBC guidelines relating to balance are[…] so diligently applied that the opinion of 100 so-called experts must always be weighed[…], vox pops remain a chance for journalists to run more or less free.

2017 April 29, Catherine Bennett, “Want to know what people really think? Don’t do a vox pop”, in The Guardian:

Vox pops – a series of comments from a variety of people – are a great way to include a sample of public opinion in your programmes and to add colour to reports that would otherwise suffer from a lack of lively soundbites.

2018, Gary Hudson, Sarah Rowlands, The Broadcast Journalism Handbook, Routledge, →ISBN:

(journalism) A short, informal, non-prearranged interview with a member of the public, especially to canvas opinion.


tombstone

tombstones (plural)
tomb-stone (alternative archaic)

(journalism) A printed advertisement in a newspaper or magazine, typically having unadorned centered text in black and white, enclosed in a simple box.


pup

Coordinate term: bulldog edition

(chiefly US, newspapers, publishing) An early edition of a periodical publication, intended for distribution to distant locations.


clipping

en-noun

clipping (countable and uncountable, plural clippings)

When a 90-year-old yellowed clipping appeared one day at my feet, an implausible new mystery entered my life.

2011 November 19, James Bishop Jr., “Grand Canyon mystery runs deep”, in The Arizona Republic:

(countable, journalism) An article clipped from a newspaper (especially) or from a magazine.


catalectic

From Latin catalecticus, from Ancient Greek καταληκτικός (katalēktikós, “leaving off, incomplete”) from κατάληξις (katálēxis).

der

καταληκτικός

(poetry) A line with incomplete meter, lacking a syllable at the end or ending with an incomplete foot.


introverted

en-adj

introverted (comparative more introverted, superlative most introverted)

more introverted (comparative)
most introverted (superlative)
introvert (alternative)

In the Quatrain Reversed or Introverted, the first line corresponds with the fourth.

1896, Richard Green Moulton, The Literary Study of the Bible, page 50:

(poetry, literature) Arranged so that two similar words, lines, etc. form the middle of the structure.


englyn

The concluding Englyn has written below it, in a very bad and quite different hand, "Dauid (or Daniel?) Davies," but whether this name is that of the supposed author of the Englynion, or that of one of the owners of the MS., we cannot say.

1892, F[rancis] T[urner] Palgrave, “Henry Vaughan of Scethrog, 1622–1695: Some Notes on His Life and Characteristics as a Poet of Welsh Descent”, in Egerton Phillimore, editor, Y Cymmrodor: The Magazine of the Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion, volume XI, London: Printed for the Society [Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion] by Gilbert & Rivington, Limited, St. John's House, Clerkenwell, London, E.C., page 222:

The metrical system of the canine original, which recalls the intricate alliterative and isosyllabic rules of the Welsh englyn, is infinitely more complicated but we believe our readers will agree that the spirit has been well caught.

1922 February 2, James Joyce, Ulysses: A Novel, Paris: Shakespeare and Company; Sylvia Beach, OCLC 560090630; republished London: Published for the Egoist Press, London by John Rodker, Paris, October 1922, OCLC 2297483, page 299

The englyn as we know it in Canu Llywarch Hen and Elegy on Cynddylan is characterized by three lines with end rhyme.

1993, Sarah Lynn Higley, Between Languages: The Uncooperative Text in Early Welsh and Old English Nature Poetry, University Park, Pa.: Pennsylvania State University Press, →ISBN:

(poetry) A short Welsh or Cornish poem of a variable structure, with each line using quantitative metre and cynghanedd (a repeating pattern of consonants and accent), and different lines being arranged in standardized patterns of rhyme and half rhyme.


ottava

From Italian ottava (“octave”) (also feminine form of ottavo (“eighth”), ordinal form of otto).


romp

en-verb

romp (third-person singular simple present romps, present participle romping, simple past and past participle romped)

romps (present singular third-person)
romping (participle present)
romped (participle past)
romped (past)

This wasn't salacious, romping 'sex', tabloid style

1997, Soundings: A Journal of Politics and Culture:

Ladbrokes is offering 2-1 odds that contestants WILL romp in the ten-week show.

2006, Martin Conboy, quoting The Sun, Tabloid Britain: Constructing a Community Through Language, Taylor & Francis, →ISBN, page 204:

One young lady who had just romped with an A-List Hollywood star, panicked during my strategic silence and threw in an entirely unexpected line about how he'd enjoyed throttling himself with his tie.

2010 May 13, Sharon Marshall, Tabloid Girl, Hachette UK, →ISBN:

(slang, chiefly newspapers) To engage in playful or illicit sex.


prosody

en-noun

prosody (countable and uncountable, plural prosodies)

From Middle French prosodie, from Latin prosōdia, from Ancient Greek προσῳδία (prosōidía, “song sung to music; pronunciation of syllable”), from πρός (prós, “to”) + ᾠδή (ōidḗ, “song”).

der

But the system of prosody in Samson plainly forbids extrametrical syllables in the midst of the line, and there is certainly no other example.

1894, Robert Bridges, Milton's Prosody, Oxford University Press, page 30:

(poetry) The study of poetic meter; the patterns of sounds and rhythms in verse.


adaptation

en-noun

adaptation (countable and uncountable, plural adaptations)

adaptations (plural)
adaption (alternative rare)

/ˌædəpˈteɪʃən/

/ˌædæpˈteɪʃən/

/aˈɖæpˌʈeːʃan/

From French adaptation, from Medieval Latin adaptātiō, from Latin adaptō (“I fit, adjust, modify; I adapt, fit or adjust to”); see adapt. Equivalent to adapt + -ation.

der

Having partly a bibliographic value, and partly confirming the statements above as to Balzac's influence, the following details concerning theatrical adaptations of some of his novels may serve as a supplement to this chapter.

(countable, authorship) An artistic work that has been adapted from a different medium.


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


decima

Borrowed from Spanish décima, from Latin decima (“a tenth”). Doublet of decim, decime, and dime.

His album... dealt with the song form of Puerto Rican back-country troubadours, and it had a preoccupation with... the décima, a 10-line stanza with specific rhyme schemes.

(poetry) A 10-line verse or stanza, (chiefly) in the form of a song comprising an introductory verse followed by four such divisions.


clustering

(writing) A prewriting technique consisting of writing ideas down on a sheet of paper around a central idea within a circle, with the related ideas radially joined to the circle using rays.


envoy

From French envoyé (“envoy, messenger”), from envoyer (“send”).

(poetry) Alternative spelling of envoi (“short stanza at end of poem”).


teleplay

(authorship) A script formatted like a screenplay for cinema, but written to be made into an episode of a television show.


screenplay

screenplays (plural)
screen play (alternative)

Coordinate term: radioplay

I know Corinne would be happy if I started writing scripts again. Since my last screenplay, I haven't written anything in over four months.

(authorship, cinematography) A script for a movie or a television show; especially, the former specifically.


háček

háčeks (plural)
háčky (plural)
haček (alternative)
hacek (alternative)
hachek (alternative)
haċek (alternative)
hatcheck (alternative)
hatschek (alternative)
hatchek (alternative)
hacheck (alternative)
hac̬ek (alternative)
haczek (alternative)
hácek (alternative)
haĉek (alternative)
haceck (alternative)

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

First attested in 1951; from the Czech háček (“háček”, literally “little hook”), the diminutive of hák (“hook”) (from Middle High German hāken, from Old High German hāko (“hook”), from Proto-Germanic *hakô (“hook”), from Proto-Indo-European *keg-, *keng- (“peg, hook”)) + the diminutive suffix -ek. Cognate with and formed like English hooklet and German Häkchen. Also cognate with Old English haca (“hook, door-fastening”) and modern English hake (more information below).

cog

The caret (ˇ), háček, is used over the following consonants: c, d, n, t, r, s, and z to indicate the soft sound.

1948, Bohumil Emil Mikula, Progressive Czech (Bohemian), page 6:

Linguistic forms had to be set in ordinary roman type and the capital C of Cäxa had to be left without a háček.

1951, Hans Jakob Polotsky, Notes on Gurage Grammar, page 5:

Good Teutonic Kitsch looks rather forlorn and out of place wearing a Bohemian háček over its shrunken hind quarters. But the high traditions of scholarship must be maintained, and on these pages Meester Kitsch will masquerade as Mr. Kič.

1956, Morris Halle, editor, For Roman Jakobson, page 332:

In the system used here and elsewhere in this article for Bantu tone, low syllables are unmarked, high syllables have an acute accent, and rising syllables a haček respectively; thus a, á, ǎ.

1966, Charles Ernest Bazell et al., editors, In Memory of J.R. Firth, page 205:

The printer had no hatchek — the flattened “v” that appears over letters in Czech — to put over Dvořak’s R. So somebody laboriously inked in all the hatcheks.

1991, Peter Hugh Reed, American Record Guide, LIV:ii, page 69:

háček used to signify the third tone (wǔ — ‘five’)

2002, Torbjörn Lundmark, Quirky QWERTY, page 34:

Another orthographic practice […] was developed […] in the twentieth century: this is the adoption of the hacek for the representation of the Cypriot postalveolar fricatives and affricates, which are otherwise not distinguished by the normal characters of the Greek alphabet alone. It was not until very recently, therefore, that the spellings <σ̌>, <τσ̌>, <ζ̌> and <τζ̌>, for [ʃ], [tʃ], [ʒ] and [dʒ] respectively, became available.

2005, Stavroula Varella, Language Contact and the Lexicon in the History of Cypriot Greek, page 46:

My father always wrote Bětik with a little “v” called haĉek, above the “e”; Marušaks placed the haĉek above the “s”.

2006, Mary Betik Trojacek, Beyond Ellis Island, page 17:

For examples of the usage of other forms of this term see Citations:háček, Citations:haček, Citations:hacek, Citations:haċek, Citations:hachek, Citations:hatcheck, Citations:hatschek, Citations:hǎcek, Citations:hatchek, Citations:hacheck, Citations:hac̬ek, Citations:haczek, Citations:háçek, Citations:hácek, Citations:haĉek, Citations:haceck and Citations:háčky.

diacritical mark
diacritical mark#English

(orthography and typography) A caron; a diacritical mark (ˇ) usually resembling an inverted circumflex, but in the cases of ď, Ľ, ľ, and ť resembling a prime (′) instead.

Ǎǎ Čč Ďď Ěě Ǧǧ Ȟȟ Ǐǐ J̌ǰ Ǩǩ Ľľ Ňň Ǒǒ Řř Šš Ťť Ǔǔ Ǚǚ Žž Ǯǯ DŽDždž Ǆǅǆ

acute accent

diacritics used in Latin-derived scripts

comma

above right ( ̕); below ( ̦), reversed (ʽ), turned (ʻ)

hook

above ( ̉); palatal ( ̡), retroflex ( ̢), rhotic (˞)

tilde

above (˜); below ( ̰), double ( ͠ ), middle / overlay ( ̴), vertical ( ̾)


baria

bareia (alternative)
varia (alternative)

(orthography and typography) An Ancient Greek pitch-marking diacritic: ⟨ ` ⟩; written atop vowels, it denotes normal or low pitch.


spondaic

From Latin spondaicus, spondiacus, from Ancient Greek σπονδειακός (spondeiakós, “(music) used at a libation”).

der

(poetry) Having or relating to spondees.


trochaic

trochaics (plural)
troch. (alternative abbreviation)
trochaick (alternative obsolete)

Either via the French trochaïque or directly from its etymon, the Latin trochaicus, from the Ancient Greek τροχαικός (trokhaikós), from τροχαῖος (trokhaîos), whence trochee.

(poetry) A poetical composition of this kind.


terza rima

en-noun

terza rima (usually uncountable, plural terze rime)

/ˌtɛːtsə ˈɹiːmə/

Borrowed from Italian terza rima (literally “third rhyme”).

bor

In attempting to make the ‘Divina Commedia’ better known to English readers, it might have been held only a fitting mark of deference to my original to reproduce it, if practicable, in the metre of the poet's own choice. But on the appearance of my ‘Inferno,’ its Terza Rima was denounced as the one ‘deleterious ingredient’ which corrupted the version throughout, […]

1865, Dante Alighieri, “preface”, in John Dayman, transl., The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri: Translated in Terza Rima by John Dayman, page viii:

(poetry) An arrangement of triplets, generally in iambic pentameter in English, with rhyme scheme aba bcb cdc.

тэрцы́на

arrangement of triplets rhyming aba bcb cdc


fixer

Yet at the same time, this is also the source of what journalists see as one of the major risks involved in dependence on the fixer: the fixer may determine, to some extent, what the journalist sees. It is at this point that differences between journalists become apparent in the interviews – they give different evaluations of the risks. Clearly, this is a point of tension in their understanding of the situation: the prime positive qualities of the fixer are also the potentially negative ones.

2007, Myriam Salama-Carr, Translating and Interpreting Conflict, Rodopi, →ISBN, page 25:

(journalism) A person who assists foreign journalists in volatile countries, often providing interpretation, personal connections, and transportation services.


legman

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Mélange a trois-legman.wav

From leg + -man, modelled after legwork, in reference to the walking such a person does.

[page 136] This was my abrupt introduction to the system by which most of the live news is handled for the New York evening newspapers [...] Its continued use has bred up two distinct and separate types of news-specialists—the leg man, who gets the story, but rarely writes it; and the rewrite man, who writes the story but rarely gets it. [...] [page 140] City editors rail against these news combines, but it was the instinct of self-preservation that long ago drove the leg men into tight and fast organizations.

1913, Irvin S[hrewsbury] Cobb, The Saturday Evening Post, volume 185, Philadelphia, Pa., London: Curtis Publishing Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 23; republished in “The Third Stick”, in Stickfuls: (Myself—To Date) (The Works of Irvin S. Cobb), New York, N.Y.: The Review of Reviews Corporation publishers; published by arrangement with George H[enry] Doran Company, 1923, →OCLC, part 1 (Getting Set in New York: In Three Takes), pages 136 and 140:

Morris Cramm was night legman for a columnist and worked from seven in the evening to five in the morning.

1949, John Macdonald [pseudonym; Kenneth Millar], chapter 5, in The Moving Target, New York, N.Y.: Alfred A. Knopf, →OCLC; republished as Ross Macdonald, The Moving Target (Vintage Crime/Black Lizard), New York, N.Y.: Vintage Books, March 1998, →ISBN, page 32:

The guy looked and acted like a cheap hood when he was the head legman for one of the biggest of the syndicated columnists.

1951, Mickey Spillane, chapter 5, in The Big Kill (Guilt Edged Mystery), New York, N.Y.: E[dward] P[ayson] Dutton, →OCLC; republished as The Big Kill (Mike Hammer series; 5), London: The Murder Room, 2015, →ISBN:

Many of the changes which have taken place in the newspaper field within the last fifty years have been in the direction of specialization. At the turn of the century, for example, a reporter got his stories, wrote them, and sometimes even made up his own headlines. Legmen and rewrite men were practically unknown.

1954, Edmond D[avid] Coblentz, “Introduction: The Drift toward Specialization”, in Edmond D. Coblentz, editor, Newsmen Speak: Journalists on Their Craft, Berkeley, Los Angeles, Calif., London: University of California Press, →OCLC, page 125:

LEG MEN cover local events and phone the information to a rewrite man. The leg man must have a good nose for news and the ability to give information over the phone quickly and accurately. He seldom writes his own stories.

1973, “Newspaper and Wire Service Operations”, in Journalist 3 & 2: Naval Training Command Rate Training Manual (NAVTRA 10294-C), Washington, D.C.: Published by Naval Training Command; United States Government Printing Office, →OCLC, page 153, column 2:

They all said, "What can you expect when you put a leg-man into a spot like that?" and "How can a youngster like that, with only a year's experience in the newspaper business behind him, handle that sort of an assignment?" [...]

a. 1986, Theodore Sturgeon, “His Good Angel”, in Paul Williams, editor, The Ultimate Egoist, volume I (The Complete Stories of Theodore Sturgeon), Berkeley, Calif.: North Atlantic Books, published 1994, →ISBN, page 107:

Of course newspapers have to have "leg men," especially for afternoon editions, who seldom write their own stories but have to telephone in facts to be hurried into type for press time. But leg men nowadays are expected to be literate, though sometimes barely.

2008, Louis M. Lyons, “Leg Men”, in M. A. Lyons, editor, A Pause to Copy: Memoirs of Louis M. Lyons, Journalist, volume IV, [Bloomington, Ind.]: Xlibris, →ISBN, page 91:

[Allen] Raymond was the son of a Methodist lay preacher who traded his Ivy League, New England pedigree for a hardboiled journalistic persona cultivated over decades as a "legman," rewrite man, copyeditor, and reporter for a dozen urban newspapers, mostly in metropolitan New York.

2009, James T. Fisher, “Epilogue: Souls of the (Port) Apostolate”, in On the Irish Waterfront: The Crusader, the Movie, and the Soul of the Port of New York (Cushwa Center Studies of Catholicism in Twentieth-century America), Ithaca, N.Y., London: Cornell University Press, →ISBN, page 299:

(originally US, journalism) A reporter who frequently travels to conduct research, interview witnesses, etc., and then conveys the information to a rewriteman who writes up the story.


versification

en-noun

versification (countable and uncountable, plural versifications)

(poetry) The act, art, or practice of composing poetic verse; the construction or measure of verse or poetry; metrical composition.


lead-in

(journalism) A short phrase that begins the caption of a photograph.


apostrophic

All we need to know is that, in Shakespeare’s time, an apostrophe indicated omitted letters, which meant Hamlet could say with supreme apostrophic confidence: “Fie on’t! O fie!”; […]

2003 November 6, Lynne Truss, “The Tractable Apostrophe”, in Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation, London: Profile Books Ltd, →ISBN, page 38:

(orthography) Pertaining to the grammatical use of, or using, the apostrophe (the diacritical mark ').

apostrófico

pertaining to the apostrophe (the diacritical mark ')


subtitle

(authorship) A heading below or after a title.


confessionalism

confessionalism (countable and uncountable, plural confessionalisms)

Confessionalism (poetry)
Confessionalism (religion)

Her rendition of "Dry Land" from her first album, Back to the Night, was a poetic fusion of music and lyrics that achieved an intimate tone too often sacrificed to confessionalism by other singers.

1977 April 23, Steve Blevins, “Armatrading: "Sit Back And See"”, in Gay Community News, page 11:

(poetry) A style of American poetry that draws on the personal history of the poet.


logline

loglines (plural)
logge-line (alternative)
log lyne (alternative)
logg line (alternative)
logg-line (alternative)
loggline (alternative)
log line (alternative)
log-line (alternative)

First attested in 1613 as logge-line. A compound of log + line.

Coordinate term: elevator pitch

Screenwriting Tip #12: If you don't know your own logline, you probably don't know what your script is about. Some writers will tell you they don't have a logline. Their screenplay is “too complex” or “too character-driven,” […]

2013, Xander Bennett, Screenwriting Tips, You Hack, page 16:

The first step in outlining is to make sure that your logline, that one-or-two- sentence summary of your movie you first created in chapter 2 (“Jump-starting the Screenplay”), is the best that it can be in capturing what your movie is about now.

2013, Linda Venis, Cut to the Chase: Writing Feature Films with the Pros at UCLA Extension Writers' Program, Penguin, →ISBN:

(authorship) A very short summary of a script or screenplay.


introversion

introversion (usually uncountable, plural introversions)

/ɪntɹəʊˈvɜːʃən/

/ɪntɹəˈvəɹʒən/

/ɪntɹəˈvəɹʃən/

/ɪntɹoʊˈvəɹʃən/

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

From New Latin intrōversio, from intrōvertere (“to turn within”), from Classical Latin intro (“within”) and vertere (“to turn”). Equivalent to introvert + -sion.

Such introversion is merely a matter of form.

1896, Richard Green Moulton, The Literary Study of the Bible, page 50:

(poetry and literature) Arrangement of two similar words, lines, etc. to form the middle part of a structure.


poulter's measure

poulter's measure (plural poulter's measures)

Coined by George Gascoigne in 1576, because it was said that poulters gave 12 eggs for the first dozen and 14 if you bought a second dozen.

Good ladies, ye that have your pleasure in exile
Step in your foot, come take a place and mourn with me awhile.
And such as by their lords do set but little price,
Let them sit still, it skills them not what chance come on the dice.

1547, Earl Surrey, Complaint on the absence of her lover being at sea.:

(poetry) A metre with alternate lines of 12 and 14 syllables.


screamer

(journalism, slang) An exclamation mark.

Hartley's argument usefully reminds us that the spread of celebrity is not just the consequence of an accumulation of publicity handouts, advertisements, chat show interviews, or the shock-horror revelations in the tabloid screamers.

2004, Graeme Turner, Understanding Celebrity, page 17:

(journalism, slang) A large, attention-getting headline.


kenning

A learned borrowing from Old Norse kenning, from kenna (“to know; to perceive”), from Proto-Germanic *kannijaną (“to make known”); see further at etymology 1. Compare can, keen, ken.

der

[A]s we are all aware, the Skalds used all sorts of kennings from Jewels, Gold, Silver, &c., to betoken Women, &c. Gold is called "The Sea's Blink (Blik)", and so on, and a female is "Gold's Mistress", "The Goddess of the Golden Jewel", and so forth.

1867–1868, George Stephens, “Bracteates”, in The Old-Northern Runic Monuments of Scandinavia and England, Now First Collected and Deciphered, volume II, London: John Russell Smith; Copenhagen: Michaelsen and Tillge; printed by H. H. Thiele, →OCLC, pages 509–510:

I venture to say that a close study of the style of Piers Plowman would thoroughly dispose of alliteration as chief factor in the kenning-process.

1887 January, Francis B. Gummere, “Wilhelm Bode: Die Kenningar in der angelsächsen Dichtung. Mit Ausblicken auf andere Litteraturen. Darmstadt und Leipzig, 1886. [Strasburg Dissertation].”, in A. Marshall Elliott, editor, Modern Language Notes, volume II, number 1, Baltimore, Md.: [Johns Hopkins Press], →ISSN, →OCLC, column 36:

If we now move to the second helmingr, Kock tries to unscramble the two kenningar[…], but this is over-zealous, since there are ample parallels for such braiding of kenning elements. Finnbogi interprets the kenning 'ǫrbeiðanda bǫðvar jǫkla' contextually, to mean 'the one who provoked the warrior into drawing his sword' (Orkneyinga saga, 202).

2006, Viking and Medieval Scandinavia, Turnhout, Antwerp, Belgium: Brepols, →OCLC, page 149:

The original also makes frequent use of the circumlocutory type of poetic expression known as the kenning, which consists (in its simplest form) of a base-word (always a noun, sometimes the second of the two elements in a compound word) accompanied by a determinant (either a noun in the genitive or, in the case of a compound-word kenning, the first of the compound's two elements).

2007, Andrew Wawn with Graham Johnson and John Walter, editors, Constructing Nations, Reconstructing Myth: Essays in Honour of T. A. Shippey (Making in the Middle Ages; 9), Turnhout, Antwerp, Belgium: Brepols, →ISBN, page 172:

(poetry) A metaphorical compound or phrase, used especially in Germanic poetry (Old English or Old Norse) whereby a simple thing is described in an allusive way.

kenning

metaphorical phrase used in Germanic poetry


cutline

(journalism, broadcasting) In production, a hypothetical line that separates items that will be executed and publicized, versus items that will be cut.

(journalism, broadcasting) A caption under a photograph, or more narrowly just the explanatory text block under a photograph, excluding the title.


dipody

From di- + -pody, from Ancient Greek δι- (di-, “two”) and πούς, ποδός (poús, podós, “foot”).


duple

PIE word
 *dwóh₁
From Latin duplus (“twofold, double”). Attested since the 16th century. Doublet of double and doppio.

McGonagall is earnestly trying to gather the resources of a metrical tradition, not subvert it, but the mismatch of duple and triple measure in the first line alone means that, while it’s made of recognisable metrical feet, the line doesn’t feel like it belongs to any specific metrical pattern (iambic, dactylic, anapestic etc) or mode (pastoral, elegy or ballad).

2015, Ben Lerner, “Diary”, in London Review of Books, volume 38, number 12:


kavya

(poetry) A highly artificial Sanskrit literary style used by Indian court poets in the early centuries AD.


improvisatore

en-noun

improvisatore (plural improvisatores or improvisatori)

improvisatores (plural)
improvisatori (plural)
improvvisatore (alternative)

Coordinate term: improvisatrice

There were buffoons, there were improvisatori, there were ballet-dancers, there were musicians, there was Beauty, there was wine.

1842, Edgar Allan Poe, The Masque of the Red Death:

(poetry) An individual who recites impromptu verse, as from a song or poem.


apologetic apostrophe

apologetic apostrophe (plural apologetic apostrophes)

While not all agreements were carried out as planned, what this attempt at consistency achieved in Smith's case was to give his poetry the appearance of a distinctive literary language, related to English, but having its own identity and forms, and without the distraction for the reader of the apologetic apostrophes.

2009, Margery Palmer McCulloch, Scottish Modernism and Its Contexts 1918-1959:

(sociolinguistics, orthography) An apostrophe added to a Scots word in order to give the appearance that it is a contraction of an English word.


okurigana

(orthography) In the Japanese language, the kana which follow a stem written with kanji, which record how that stem is inflected, and guides recognition of the appropriate kun'yomi reading (word stem associated with the kanji); for example, く (ku) and かべる (kaberu) in 浮(う)く (uk-u, “to float”, intransitive) and 浮(う)かべる (uk-aberu, “to float”, transitive), or む (mu) and きる (kiru) in 生(う)む (umu, “to birth”) and 生(い)きる (ikiru, “to live”). Perhaps analogous to -st, -nd in English 1st (first), 2nd (second).


dénouement

dénouement (countable and uncountable, plural dénouements)

dénouements (plural)
denouement (alternative)
dénoûment (alternative)

Unadapted borrowing from French dénouement (“resolution”, literally “unknotting”).

ubor

Emily was a great favourite with him; and he had always viewed the attachment, at whose dénouement between her and Lorraine, Lady Mandeville meant to preside, as a somewhat foolish romance.

1831, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XIX, in Romance and Reality. […], volume II, London: Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley, […], →OCLC, page 271:

At last this affair is moving towards the explosive dénouement he has been craving — the revelation, the release of tension, that will shake the universe in one fierce convulsion, and then allow everything to fall back into its rightful place, restored to normality!

2002, Michel Faber, The Crimson Petal and the White, Canongate Books (2010), page 830:

(authorship, often figuratively) The conclusion or resolution of a plot; unravelling.


letter to the editor

en-noun

letter to the editor (plural letters to the editor or letters to editors)

letters to the editor (plural)
letters to editors (plural)

The man wanted to show support for his choice for mayor by writing a letter to the editor.

(journalism) A letter written to a newspaper, magazine or other periodical, usually intended for publication, about issues of concern to readers.


haikai

haikai (countable and uncountable, plural haikai)

Borrowed from Japanese 俳(はい)諧(かい) (haikai).

A form of Japanese comic verse, featuring satire and puns.


above the fold

below the scroll

antonym(s) of “near the top of a web page or application screen”

(newspapers) Situated in the upper half of the front page of a broadsheet newspaper, and thus more prominent, as the lower half is not usually visible when the folded newspaper is displayed for sale.


monometer

(poetry) A line of verse containing a single metrical foot.


vocalization

vocalization (countable and uncountable, plural vocalizations)

vowelization

supplying vowels/diacritics to Arabic and Hebrew words/texts

(orthography) The vowel diacritics in certain scripts, like Hebrew and Arabic, which are not normally written, but which are used in dictionaries, children's books, religious texts and textbooks for learners.

تَشْكِيل

supplying the vowels (diacritics), e.g. Arabic and Hebrew

(orthography, phonology) The addition of these diacritics and the respective phonemes to a word; the spoken form the word thereby receives.


ABCs

(obsolete, poetry) A type of poem in which the lines start with the letters of the alphabet in order.


book signing

(authorship) An event where an author signs copies of her/his books for fans.


monophonic

From a similar selection, says M. Remusat, the Coreans have made a monophonic alphabet of nine vowels and fifteen consonants, with which they write their language.

1828 July 7, Peter S. Du Ponceau, “On some Points connected with the Nature of the Chinese Language (enclosure in letter from Basil Hall)”, in The Philosophical magazine, volume 5:

(orthography) having simple one-to-one mapping between letters and phonemes


ogonek

From Polish ogonek (literally “little tail”).

The pangram “Pchnąć w tę łódź jeża lub ośm skrzyń fig” (To push a hedgehog or eight boxes of figs into that boat) highlights a few of the language-specific diacritical marks, such as L with stroke (ł) and ogoneks (ą, ę) necessary to write in Polish—demonstrating how a writing system can accommodate many languages with thorough character inclusion.

2023, Mia Cinelli, Giving Type Meaning: Context and Craft in Typography, Bloomsbury, →ISBN:

(orthography) A hook-shaped diacritical mark ⟨◌̨⟩ attached underneath a vowel, typically to indicate nasalization, as in Ąą, Ęę, Įį, Ǫǫ or Ųų.


synchronizer

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Naomi Persephone Amethyst (NaomiAmethyst)-synchronizer.wav

(film editing) A device for aligning multiple film strips in a replay or editing device.


dish bitch

(slang, derogatory, journalism) A reporter who appears using a satellite connection, and must therefore be close to their satellite dish.


cheville

Borrowed from French cheville. Doublet of clavicle.

The genius of prose rejects the cheville no less emphatically than the laws of verse; and the cheville, I should perhaps explain to some of my readers, is any meaningless or very watered phrase employed to strike a balance in the sound.

1905, Robert Louis Stevenson, The Art of Writing:

The practice of using chevilles was very common in old Irish poetry, and a bad practice it was; for many a good poem is quite spoiled by the constant and wearisome recurrence of these chevilles.

1910, Patrick Weston Joyce, English as we speak it in Ireland, chapter 5:

(poetry) A word or phrase whose only function is to make a sentence metrically balanced.


K-hed

(US, journalism) A brief news item in a newspaper consisting of a one-line heading and a single paragraph, especially one of little interest added to fill space.


hed

Deliberately altered spelling of head, to distinguish the word as not belonging in a journalistic story. Compare lede (“lead, introduction”). Also an archaic spelling.

(journalism, slang) The headline of a news story.


rubai

rubaiyat (plural)
rubais (plural)
ruba'i (alternative)
rubāʿī (alternative)

Borrowed from Arabic رُبَاعِيّ (rubāʕiyy).

(poetry) A quatrain in classical Arabic, Persian, Turkic or Urdu poetry.


skyline

(journalism) A panel on the front page of a newspaper outlining some of the features to be found inside.


black letter

black letter (countable and uncountable, plural black letters)

black letters (plural)
blackletter (alternative)
black-letter (alternative)

Also we discovered what is still more curious, an English version of the black-letter Latin.

1886 October – 1887 January, H[enry] Rider Haggard, She: A History of Adventure, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., published 1887, →OCLC:

The original boldface printing types are the blackletters used by Gutenberg in the 1440s. For the next two centuries, blackletter fonts were widely used not only in Germany but in France, Spain, the Netherlands and England.

2002, Robert Bringhurst, The Elements of Typographic Style (version 2.5), Vancouver: Hartley & Marks, →ISBN, page 103:

(calligraphy) A highly calligraphic Western European script style used from approximately 1150.

(typography) A Northern European style of type based on the script, with contrasting thick-and-thin, angular strokes forming upright letterforms, and usually set with a dark typographic colour on the page.


pantsing

pantsing (countable and uncountable, plural pantsings)

Coordinate term: plotting

Here's how to painlessly make pantsing your backup. The unknown can be intimidating. The key to pantsing is to not worry about how it will all hang together. Just start writing.

2017, The Complete Handbook of Novel Writing, Penguin, →ISBN:

(informal, writing) An improvised style of writing without an outline.


cancrine

en-adj

cancrine (comparative more cancrine, superlative most cancrine)

more cancrine (comparative)
most cancrine (superlative)

From Latin cancer (“crab”) + -īnus, as if from *cancrīnus. The poetry sense comes from the fact that most species of crab can walk sideways, either left or right.

[…] the prodigious variety of ſo many kinds of verſe, Leonine, Alexandrine, Acroſtic, Chronologic, Hieroglyphic, Cancrine, Croſs-formed, Labyrinthic, Pyramidal, and a thouſand other follies […]

1772, José Francisco de Isla, translated by Thomas Nugent, The History of the Famous Preacher Friar Gerund de Campazas: Otherwise Gerund Zotes, volume I, London: T. Davies, page 233:

A marble bénitier, vessel for holy water, is surrounded with what Alvarez has denominated a recurrent, or Cancrine verse, which forms the same words beginning at each end: ΝΙΨΟΝ ΑΝΟΜΗΜΑΤΑ ΜΗ ΜΟΝΑΝ ΟΨΙΝ.

1814, “A Short Sketch of a Short Trip to Paris”, in Abraham John Valpy, editor, The Pamphleteer, volume III, number VI, page 532:

(poetry) Palindromic; reading the same forwards or backwards.


spiritus asper

From Latin spīritus asper (literally “rough breath”).

bor

The spiritus asper mark looks like an opening single quote, as in the word εὑρίσκω (heurískõ), the word εὕρηκα (heúrēka), or the word ἕξις (héxis, "habit").

h, as an aspirate, is very frequent in Chinese ; it is generally a stronger aspirate than in English : in the dialects of the south it is often changed into f, in the north into s, or sh. To mark an aspirate after a consonant, we use the Greek spiritus asper in preference to h.

1836 May, “System of Orthography for Chinese words”, in The Chinese Repository, volume V, number I, page 27:

(orthography) A diacritic mark ( ʻ ) in Ancient Greek used to indicate the aspiration of an initial vowel or rho; also used for a similar sound in the Wade–Giles system of romanization for Mandarin Chinese.

examples from the Wade–Giles romanization system


spiritus lenis

Learned borrowing from Latin spīritus lēnis.

lbor

smooth breathing
smooth breathing#English

(orthography) Synonym of smooth breathing.


WaPo

It's quite impressive that the WaPo editorial board has come out with both barrels against <b₂> their own journalists <c₂>. (Black 2016)

2017, Scott A. Eldridge II, Online Journalism from the Periphery: Interloper Media and the Journalistic Field, Routledge, →ISBN:

(informal, newspapers) Clipping of Washington Post, a newspaper from the United States.


run in

en-adj

run in (not generally comparable, comparative more run in, superlative most run in)

more run in (comparative)
most run in (superlative)

These headings are run in because a free-hanging style would just be a waste of column inches.

One of the best headings for saving space is the heading that is run in.

1956, Daniel Melcher, Nancy Larrick, Printing and Promotion Handbook:

Third subheadings begin paragraphs (are indented and run in).

1976, American Institute of Physics, Editorial Handbook, page 17:

You can select how far you want subentries indented, how many lines between each entry and alphabetical block, and whether you want the final index indented (each sub- and sub-subheading indented under its parent) or run in (subheadings in paragraph form under the main heading).

1985 April 16, Charles Anderson, “The Ins and Outs of Indexing”, in PC Mag, volume 4, number 8, page 322:

Heading levels 3 through 7 are run in headings — the text that follows the heading appears on the same line as the heading.

1987, Rachel Morgan, Henry McGilton, Introducing UNIX System V, page 333:

Secondary headings are flush left, in regular type, and capitalized headline style. Tertiary headings are run in at the beginning of a paragraph, in bold type, capitalized sentence style, and followed by a period.

2019, Editorial staff, “Guide to Authors”, in Nagoya Journal of Medical Science, archived from the original on 2021-12-23:

Alternative form of run-in (adjective) (styled open when in predicative position)

(participial adjective; editing, typography) (not comparable) Having been run in before or behind previous text.


rondeau

From Middle French rondeau, from Old French rondel. Doublet of rondo.

Though we have the English rondels of Occleve and a set of rondeaus in the Rolliad (written by Dr. Lawrence, the friend of Burke, according to Mr. Edmund Gosse, who has given us an admirable essay upon exotic forms of verse), […].

1914, Theodore Watts-Dunton, Poetry and The Renascence of Wonder, page 198:

First of all, the two rondeaux appear in the 1538 version of the previously published Adoleseenee Clementine at the end of the section of poems of the same genre.

1991, Doranne Fenoaltea, David Lee Rubin, The Ladder of High Designs, page 50:

(poetry) A fixed form of verse based on two rhyme sounds and consisting usually of 13 lines in three stanzas with the opening words of the first line of the first stanza used as an independent refrain after the second and third stanzas.


pantser

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

From the expression fly by the seat of one's pants.

Coordinate term: plotter

(slang, writing) An author who writes their story without a plan or an outline.


sausage factory

en-noun

sausage factory (plural sausage factories)

In the sense of a gathering without women, sausage is a euphemism for penis. In other figurative senses, it is an example of a food that may be made from distasteful ingredients.

(journalism) The process of creating news, involving the pursuit of stories, sources and research.


sloka meter

(poetry, Hinduism) A Sanskrit meter consisting of two lines of sixteen syllables each.


two-decker

(journalism) Synonym of double-decker (“headline covering two lines”).


spidery

en-adj

spidery (comparative more spidery, superlative most spidery)

more spidery (comparative)
most spidery (superlative)

(writing, figurative) Cramped or illegible; especially when spiky.


double-decker

double-deckers (plural)
doubledecker (alternative)
double decker (alternative)

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

(journalism) A headline that is two lines long.


topic sentence

(authorship) A sentence at the beginning of a paragraph indicating the general matter to be discussed later in that paragraph.


tagline

taglines (plural)
tag line (alternative)

(journalism, dated) Synonym of subheadline.


red top

The titles of these newspapers are traditionally presented on a red banner at the top of the front page.

Just as broadsheets only exceptionally outsell any of the tabloids, so middle-market tabloids—the Mail and Express—only rarely outsell the red tops (although the upmarket Sunday Times outsells the mid-market Express on Sunday and The Mail on Sunday outsells The People).

1997 August 13, Brian Macarthur, “Diana: mover and shaker”, in The Times:

Tabloids have their own language. Maybe it's because the pages are smaller than the broadsheet papers, or perhaps it's because they have to make room to fit all those pictures of Jordan in her knickers in each day, but tabloidese is a language and a skill peculiar to the red tops.

2010, Sharon Marshall, Tabloid Girl, Hachette UK, →ISBN:

(UK, Ireland, journalism) A tabloid newspaper, particularly one of those considered to have lower journalistic standards than the broadsheets.


media circus

(media, journalism, informal) A large gathering of reporters at the scene of a news event.


sestina

From Italian sestina. Doublet of sextain.

Although the sestina is of medieval French origin, attributed to Arnaut Daniel in the late twelfth century and used by other Gallic poets and by Italians including Petrarch and Dante (from whom it received its Italian name), […]

2002, Annie Finch, Kathrine Varnes, An Exaltation of Forms: Contemporary Poets Celebrate the Diversity of Their Art, University of Michigan Press, →ISBN, page 290:

Would he let others toil to support him while he languished all afternoon over his sestinas?

(poetry) A highly structured poem consisting of six six-line stanzas followed by a tercet or envoy, for a total of thirty-nine lines.


cutoff

cutoffs (plural)
cut off (alternative)
cut-off (alternative)

изключване

point at which something terminates or to which it is limited

Light-face type, cutoffs, borders and rules are the universal plan. No black body matter and almost no black headlines appear.

(journalism) A horizontal line separating sections of the page.


ithyphallic

ithyphallic (comparative more ithyphallic, superlative most ithyphallic)

more ithyphallic (comparative)
most ithyphallic (superlative)

/ˌɪθɪˈfælɪk/

/ˌɪθɪˈfælɪk/

Borrowed from Late Latin ithyphallicus, from Ancient Greek ἰθυφαλλικός (ithuphallikós), from ῑ̓θῠ́φαλλος (īthŭ́phallos, “phallus carried in festivals of Bacchus; ode sung in honour of the phallus; dance accompanying such an ode; dancer performing such a dance”) + -ῐκός (-ĭkós, suffix forming adjectives meaning ‘of or pertaining to’). ῑ̓θῠ́φαλλος is derived from ἰθῠ́ς (ithŭ́s) (variant of εὐθῠ́ς (euthŭ́s, “straight”)) + φαλλός (phallós, “penis; image of a penis, phallus”). The English word can be analysed as ithyphallus + -ic.
As regards the noun, compare Latin ithyphallicum (“poem with the same metre as the hymns to Priapus”).

refn

From the collection of the Museum of London in London, England, UK.

cog

(poetry) Pertaining to a metrical combination of two trochees followed by one spondee.


chunking

en-noun

chunking (countable and uncountable, plural chunkings)

(writing) A method of presenting information which splits concepts into small pieces or "chunks" of information to make reading and understanding faster and easier, using such methods as bulleted lists, short subheadings, or short sentences with one or two ideas per sentence.


vers de societe

(poetry) A type of light poetry suited to the amusement of polite upper-class society.


villanelle

From the French villanelle, from Italian villanella, from villano (“peasant”), from Latin vīllānus (“farmhand”), from vīlla (“estate”). The origin references the pastoral themes originally associated with this form.

By definition the villanelle is restrictive, because it demands nineteen lines on two rhymes in six stanzas, the first and third lines of the opening tercet recurring alternately at the end of the concluding quatrain.

1966, Louise Baughan Murdy, Sound and sense in Dylan Thomas's poetry (Studies in English Literature), The Hague: Mouton & Co, →ISBN, page 96:

(poetry) A type of poem, consisting of five tercets and one quatrain, with only two rhymes.


triolet

Coordinate term: sestina

The triolet, like the sestina and several other forms of French-derived poetry, is a form of rhyming poetry that has lines that repeat.

2005, Connie Homan Weaver, Poetry a la Carte, Prufrock Press Inc., →ISBN, page 110:

(poetry) An eight-line poem whose rhyme scheme is ABaAabAB and whose lines are in iambic tetrameter.


tombstoning

(journalism) In page layout, putting articles side by side so that the headlines are adjacent (also referred to as bumping heads), or so that headline from one article is adjacent to the photo from another.


metricize

en-verb

metricize (third-person singular simple present metricizes, present participle metricizing, simple past and past participle metricized)

metricizes (present singular third-person)
metricizing (participle present)
metricized (participle past)
metricized (past)


puff piece

Coordinate term: hit piece

That's your first question? I thought this was supposed to be a puff piece.

2004, Wes Anderson, Noah Baumbach, The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, spoken by Steve Zissou (Bill Murray):

The magazine had sent David Blum to Los Angeles to profile Emilio Estevez, arguably the most famous of the actors in Joel Schumacher's recently released St. Elmo's Fire, and what had been pitched as a typical puff piece quickly warped into a scathing portrayal that soon became scandalous.

2019, Bret Easton Ellis, White, Pan Macmillan, →ISBN:

While I don’t think Chozick’s profile was in any way a puff piece, I understand the anger it has generated. After all, not many mothers facing prison are given a splashy redemption photoshoot in a major paper, are they?

2023 May 9, Arwa Mahdawi, “Elizabeth Holmes is rebranding herself as a sweet, devoted mother. Will anyone buy it?”, in The Guardian, →ISSN:

(journalism, publishing, informal) A journalistic form of puffery; an article or story of exaggerated praise that often ignores or downplays opposing viewpoints or evidence to the contrary.


kigo

(poetry) A seasonal word; a word required in haiku to indicate the season.


(poetry, rare) Used to show an unexpectedly stressed syllable, or where the choice of stress is metrically important, e.g. idiosyncratic caléndar; noun rébel as opposed to verb rebél; áll trádes as a spondee rather than iamb.


Berliner

The first sense is either from German Berliner (“native or inhabitant of Berlin”) or formed in English from Berlin + -er. The second sense is from German Berliner (“doughnut”).

bor

(journalism) A newspaper format with pages normally measuring about 315 by 470 millimetres (12.4 in × 18.5 inches), slightly taller and wider than a tabloid but narrower and shorter than a broadsheet.


slug line

(authorship) A line of abbreviated text at the beginning of each scene in a screenplay that describes the location and time of day.


explainer

Confused by the Olympics? Here's a video explainer.

In a series of short explainers, the BBC News Channel’s Outside Source presenter has repeatedly skewered the Boris Johnson administration, while never coming within striking distance of seeming to have an opinion.

2021 December 13, Alexandra Topping, “Skewering No 10 over Christmas parties has made Ros Atkins a BBC star”, in The Guardian, retrieved 2022-09-14:

Quick explainers and infographics giving context to what was happening in Palestine were being shared all over Instagram and TikTok.

2022, Ahed Tamimi, Dena Takruri, They Called Me a Lioness […] , One World, →ISBN, page 256:

(chiefly journalism) A guide that explains a topic.