brtom has adopted no words, looked up 0 words, created 24 lists, listed 2625 words, written 769 comments, added 0 tags, and loved 0 words.

Comments by brtom

  • Hi, John! Thanks for noticing. I've been living. Will always have a soft spot in my heart (if not my head) for Wordie/Wordnik. It was there when I needed it ... and I still may. All the best to you!

    March 25, 2010

  • Pondering that which may not be worth pondering? Or ...

    March 25, 2010

  • This rantipole hero had for some time singled out the blooming Katrina for the object of his uncouth gallantries, and though his amorous toyings were something like the gentle caresses and endearments of a bear, yet it was whispered that she did not altogether discourage his hopes. Washington Irving, "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow"

    October 30, 2009

  • In other words are there certain regular sorts of flourishing which we can see in this sphere which point to more than themselves, which delate, give away, point up, something about God? James Alison

    October 11, 2009

  • "God, how I hate the names / of the body's chemicals and anatomy, / the frore and glum department / of its parts ..." Wendell Berry, "Sabbaths 2005, XIV" in Leavings

    October 3, 2009

  • "I could see that the snath had a delightful patina that came with age and good care." Brian Lowry

    March 13, 2009

  • "I looked forward to the librarian moms returning home to the borborygmic giants who would roll over on them in their sleep."

    http://www.splicetoday.com/writing/the-devil-s-playground

    February 17, 2009

  • The humus stood dark and heavy over them once; the plow was its doom. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • The humus stood dark and heavy over them once; the plow was its doom. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • ...how they would harness their mule teams in the early mornings in my grandfather's big barn and come to the woods-rimmed tobacco patches, the mules' feet wet with the dew. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • Where that thicket stands there was crop ground, maybe as late as my own time. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • There are the domestic paths from house to barns and outbuildings and gardens, farm roads threading the pasture gates. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • I think of the country as a kind of palimpsest scrawled over with the comings and goings of people, the erasure of time already in process even as the marks of passage are put down. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • A path is little more than a habit that comes with knowledge of a place. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • The idea was that when faced with abundance one should consume abundantly—an idea that has survived to become the basis of our present economy. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • But one immediately reflects that the American Indian, who was ignorant by the same standards, nevertheless knew how to live in the country without making violence the invariable mode of his relation to it ... Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • The work of clearing the road was itself violent. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • I am forced, against all my hopes and inclinations, to regard the history of my people here as the progress of the doom of what I value most in the world: the life and health of the earth, the peacefulness of human communities and households. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • I am forced, against all my hopes and inclinations, to regard the history of my people here as the progress of the doom of what I value most in the world: the life and health of the earth, the peacefulness of human communities and households. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • I came to see myself as growing out of the earth like the other native animals and plants. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • My language increased and strengthened, and sent my mind into the place like a live root system. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • I listened to the talk of my kinsmen and neighbors as I never had done, alert to their knowledge of the place, and to the qualities and energies of their speech. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • I listened to the talk of my kinsmen and neighbors as I never had done, alert to their knowledge of the place, and to the qualities and energies of their speech. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • Home—the place, the countryside—was still there, still pretty much as I had left it, and there was no reason I could not go back to it if I wanted to. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • Home—the place, the countryside—was still there, still pretty much as I had left it, and there was no reason I could not go back to it if I wanted to. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • When I have thought of the welfare of the earth, the problems of its health and preservation, the care of its life, I have had this place before me ... Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • When I have thought of the welfare of the earth, the problems of its health and preservation, the care of its life, I have had this place before me ... Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • When I have thought of the welfare of the earth, the problems of its health and preservation, the care of its life, I have had this place before me ... Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • When I have thought of the welfare of the earth, the problems of its health and preservation, the care of its life, I have had this place before me ... Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • In my acceptance of twentieth-century realities there has had to be a certain deliberateness, whereas most of my contemporaries had them simply by being born to them. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • I seem to have been born with an aptitude for a way of life that was doomed, although I did not understand that at the time. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • ... I learned to harness and hitch and work a team. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • ... I learned to harness and hitch and work a team. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • ... I learned to harness and hitch and work a team. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • The Depression and World War II delayed the mechanization of the farms here, and one of the first disciplines imposed on me was that of a teamster. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • The Depression and World War II delayed the mechanization of the farms here, and one of the first disciplines imposed on me was that of a teamster. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • The Depression and World War II delayed the mechanization of the farms here, and one of the first disciplines imposed on me was that of a teamster. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • All that any of us may know of ourselves is to be known in relation to this place. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • My house backs against the hill's foot where it descends from the town to the river. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • My house backs against the hill's foot where it descends from the town to the river. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • My house backs against the hill's foot where it descends from the town to the river. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • My house backs against the hill's foot where it descends from the town to the river. Wendell Berry "A Native Hill"

    July 19, 2008

  • Ah ... me, too. I'd guess that - if a U.S. citizen knows the term - it's 10 to 1 that he/she got it from Around the World in Eighty Days. But when I found it in Howard's poem it just didn't add up.

    February 15, 2008

  • Yes, a card game ... but in British dialect it means "to become silent" as in this from Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey (1517-1547):

    It was then night: the sound and quiet sleep

    Had through the earth the wearied bodies caught;

    The woods, the raging seas were fallen to rest;

    When that the stars had half their course declined

    The fields whist ...

    February 14, 2008

  • from Wikipedia:

    In Christian liturgical usage, an aquamanile (plural aquamanilia or simply aquamaniles) is a special ewer for the ritual washing of hands (aqua + manos) over a basin, in the ritual of the lavabo, in which the officiating priest washes his hands before vesting, again before the consecration of the Eucharist and after mass.

    January 24, 2008

  • Carrying what has accrued to it (the body) from the moment of birth to the moment of death.

    Whitman, "Starting from Paumanok"

    January 9, 2008

  • I will effuse egotism and show it underlying all, and I will be the

    bard of personality

    Whitman, "Starting from Paumanok"

    January 9, 2008

  • O such themes - equalities! O divine average!

    Whitman, "Starting from Paumanok"

    January 9, 2008

  • Melange mine own, the unseen and the seen,

    Mysterious ocean where the streams empty

    Whitman, "Starting from Paumanok"

    January 9, 2008

  • What do you need camerado?

    Whitman, "Starting from Paumanok"

    January 9, 2008

  • I say that the real and permanent grandeur of these States must be their religion,

    Otherwise there is just no real and permanent grandeur

    Whitman, "Starting from Paumanok"

    January 9, 2008

  • Omnes! omnes! let others ignore what they may,

    I make the poem of evil also, I commemorate that part also ...

    Whitman, "Starting from Paumanok"

    January 9, 2008

  • Dead poets, philosophs, priests,

    Martyrs, artists, inventors, governments long since,

    Language-shapers on other shores ...

    Whitman, "Starting from Paumanok"

    January 9, 2008

  • Chants of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Wisconsin and Minnesota,

    Chants going forth from the centre from Kansas, and thence

    equidistant,

    Shooting in pulses of fire ceaseless to vivify all.

    Whitman, "Starting from Paumanok"

    January 9, 2008

  • See, vast trackless spaces,

    As in a dream they change, they swiftly fill,

    Countless masses debouch upon them ...

    Whitman, "Starting from Paumanok"

    January 9, 2008

  • Yes, thanks, I explain that to my students. I've usually got no problem with verbing a noun ... so, I explain to them, I'll assume that's what they're doing. But, I also explain, the unintended connotations of this particular one are especially disagreeable to, at least, their teacher.

    January 7, 2008

  • A great one! How could I have missed it? Well, I did catch aureole ... but to find it used as a verb is just thrilling ... Thanks.

    January 6, 2008

  • I don't like this word ... so why do I use it?

    January 6, 2008

  • A personal peeve: this word is an adjective meaning "wedged or packed in together" ... It calls to mind unpleasant business related to teeth and bowels ... For that reason, it shouldn't be used as a verb in statements like: "Voters in South Carolina will definitely be impacted by what happened at the Iowa caucuses Thursday." source

    My heart goes out to those soon-to-be-miserable South Carolinians.

    January 6, 2008

  • Why, to be sure, a tale of scandal is as fatal to the credit of a prudent lady of her stamp as a fever is generally to those of the strongest constitutions.

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 6, 2008

  • Why, to be sure, a tale of scandal is as fatal to the credit of a prudent lady of her stamp as a fever is generally to those of the strongest constitutions.

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 6, 2008

  • True, madam, there are valetudinarians in reputation as well as constitution ...

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 6, 2008

  • She likewise hinted that a certain widow, in the next street, had got rid of her dropsy and recovered her shape in a most surprising manner.

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 6, 2008

  • Yet such is the ill nature of people, that they say her uncle stopped her last week, just as she was stepping into the York Mail with her dancing-master.

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 6, 2008

  • But the world is so censorious, no character escapes.

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 6, 2008

  • We have pride, envy, rivalship, and a thousand motives to depreciate each other; but the male slanderer must have the cowardice of a woman before he can traduce one.

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 6, 2008

  • For my part, I own, madam, wit loses its respect with me, when I see it in company with malice.

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 6, 2008

  • For my part, I own, madam, wit loses its respect with me, when I see it in company with malice.

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 6, 2008

  • For my part, I own, madam, wit loses its respect with me, when I see it in company with malice.

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 6, 2008

  • Oh! there’s that disagreeable lover of mine, Sir Benjamin Backbite, has just called at my guardian’s, with his odious uncle, Crabtree

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 6, 2008

  • Oh! there’s that disagreeable lover of mine, Sir Benjamin Backbite, has just called at my guardian’s, with his odious uncle, Crabtree

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 6, 2008

  • "Mercy is pure and devote and ironically ends up marrying one of Angel's brothers; while Tess has mixed views about her religion and is no longer virginistic." Anonymous AP Literature student.

    January 6, 2008

  • Egad, that’s true!

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 5, 2008

  • Madam, it is impossible for me to suspect a man of Mr. Snake’s sensibility and discernment.

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 5, 2008

  • Madam, it is impossible for me to suspect a man of Mr. Snake’s sensibility and discernment.

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 5, 2008

  • I know him to be artful, selfish, and malicious—in short, a sentimental knave

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 5, 2008

  • Must I confess that Charles—that libertine, that extravagant, that bankrupt in fortune and reputation—that he it is for whom I am thus anxious and malicious, and to gain whom I would sacrifice every thing?

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 5, 2008

  • Must I confess that Charles—that libertine, that extravagant, that bankrupt in fortune and reputation—that he it is for whom I am thus anxious and malicious, and to gain whom I would sacrifice every thing?

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 5, 2008

  • I must inform you that love has no share whatever in the intercourse between Mr. Surface and me.

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 5, 2008

  • Now, on the face of these circumstances, it is utterly unaccountable to me, why you, the widow of a city knight, with a good jointure, should not close with the passion of a man of such character and expectations as Mr. Surface ...

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 5, 2008

  • ... the youngest, the most dissipated and extravagant young fellow in the kingdom, without friends or character ...

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 5, 2008

  • She wants that delicacy of tint, and mellowness of sneer, which distinguish your ladyship’s scandal.

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 5, 2008

  • Lady Sneerwell. The paragraphs, you say, Mr. Snake, were all inserted?

    Snake. They were, madam; and, as I copied them myself in a feigned hand, there can be no suspicion whence they came.

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 5, 2008

  • Lady Sneerwell. The paragraphs, you say, Mr. Snake, were all inserted?

    Snake. They were, madam; and, as I copied them myself in a feigned hand, there can be no suspicion whence they came.

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 5, 2008

  • My face on niacin.

    January 4, 2008

  • "The feeling of health, the full-noon trill, the song of me rising from bed and meeting the sun." Whitman, Song of Myself, 2

    January 4, 2008

  • "The feeling of health, the full-noon trill, the song of me rising from bed and meeting the sun." Whitman, Song of Myself, 2

    January 4, 2008

  • "Flood-tide below me! I watch you face to face;" Whitman, Crossing Brooklyn Ferry, 1

    January 4, 2008

  • "Knowing the perfect fitness and equanimity of things, while they discuss I am silent, and go bathe and admire myself." Whitman, Song of Myself, 3

    January 4, 2008

  • "You shall listen to all sides and filter them from your self." Whitman, Song of Myself, 2

    January 4, 2008

  • "I am the mate and companion of people, all just as immortal and fathomless as myself," Whitman, Song of Myself, 7

    January 4, 2008

  • "What exclamations of women taken suddenly who hurry home and give birth to babes," Whitman, Song of Myself, 8

    January 4, 2008

  • Four years on, my personal declaration of, and against, lexical ignorance runs from "abscissa" (Cormac McCarthy) to "zugunruhe" (William Fiennes, who admittedly provided a helpful contextual explanation of this, the migratory restlessness of birds). James Meek

    January 3, 2008

  • Four years on, my personal declaration of, and against, lexical ignorance runs from "abscissa" (Cormac McCarthy) to "zugunruhe" (William Fiennes, who admittedly provided a helpful contextual explanation of this, the migratory restlessness of birds). James Meek

    January 3, 2008

  • I was enjoying the book until I came across the following sentence: "The albedo of Gilgit's brown, barren hills is high, and the heat from the sun just seems to bounce around the bowl that the town sits in." James Meek

    January 3, 2008

  • "She barbs with wit those darts too keen before: —"

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 2, 2008

  • "Ah! seest thou not an ambushed Cupid there,

    Too timorous of his charge, with jealous care

    Veils and unveils those beams of heavenly light ..."

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 2, 2008

  • "And bade the gentle inmate of her breast—

    Inshrinèd Modesty—supply the rest."

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 2, 2008

  • "Not stiff with prudence, nor uncouthly wild ..."

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 2, 2008

  • "Whose judgment scorns the homage flattery pays!"

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 2, 2008

  • ..." and while

    Celestial blushes check thy conscious smile ..."

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 2, 2008

  • "Attend, ye skilled to coin the precious tale,

    Creating proof, where innuendos fail!"

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 2, 2008

  • "Attend, ye skilled to coin the precious tale,

    Creating proof, where innuendos fail!"

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 2, 2008

  • "By cunning, cautious; or by nature, cold, 15

    In maiden madness, virulently bold!"

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 2, 2008

  • "Ye matron censors of this childish age,

    Whose peering eye and wrinkled front declare

    A fixed antipathy to young and fair ..."

    Sheridan, School for Scandal

    January 2, 2008

  • "Daughters of calumny, I summon you!" Sheridan, School for Scandal.

    January 2, 2008

  • I learned this word when I read an essay my brother wrote years ago. I was already old and deep into words then, so I was shocked to find a word I'd never seen or heard before.

    January 1, 2008

  • "In his free left hand he holds a slim ivory cane with a violet howknot." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "Against the dark wall a figure appears slowly, a fairy boy of eleven, a changeling, kidnapped, dressed in an Eton suit with glass shoes and a little bronze helmet, holding a book in his hand." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "Poetry. Well educated. Pity." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "Who owns the bleeding tyke?" Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "OLD GUMMY GRANNY (Thrusts a dagger towards Stephen's hand.) Remove him, acushla. At 8.35 a.m. you will be in heaven and Ireland will be free." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "Casqued halberdiers in armour thrust forward a pentice of gutted spear points." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "Absinthe, the greeneyed monster." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "Struggle for life is the law of existence but modern philirenists, notably the tsar and the king of England, have invented arbitration." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "Come now, professor, that carman is waiting." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "He doesn't half want a thick ear, the blighter. Biff him one, Harry." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "He doesn't half want a thick ear, the blighter. Biff him one, Harry." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "Stephen with hat ashplant frogsplits in middle highkicks with skykicking mouth shut hand clasp part under thigh, with clang tinkle boomhammer tallyho horn blower blue green yellow flashes." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "The twilight hours advance, from long landshadows, dispersed, lagging, languideyed, their cheeks delicate with cipria and false faint bloom." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "From a corner the morning hours run out, goldhaired, slim, in girlish blue, waspwaisted, with innocent hands." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "The crowd bowls of dicers, crown and anchor players, thimbleriggers, broadsmen." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "She sidles from her newlaid egg and waddles off." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "She sidles from her newlaid egg and waddles off." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "You're such a slyboots, old cocky. I could kiss you." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "Figures wind serpenting in slow woodland pattern around the treestems, cooeeing." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "Crawls jellily forward under the boughs, streaked by sunlight, with dignity." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "By word and deed he encouraged a nocturnal strumpet to deposit fecal and other matter in an unsanitary outhouse attached to empty premises." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "When you took your seat with womanish care, lifting your billowy flounces, on the smoothworn throne." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "Rain, exposure at dewfall on the sea rocks, a peccadillo at my time of life." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "From the sublime to the ridiculous is but a step. Pyjamas, let us say? Or stockingette gusseted knickers, closed?" Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "A new purchase at some monster sale for which a gull has been mulcted. Meretricious finery to deceive the eye." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "A new purchase at some monster sale for which a gull has been mulcted. Meretricious finery to deceive the eye." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "On his head is perched an Egyptian pshent. Two quills project over his ears." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "Are you a god or a doggone clod?" Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "Along an infinite invisible tight-rope taut from zenith to nadir the End of the World, a two headed octopus in gillies kilts, busby and tartan filibegs, whirls through the murk, head over heels, in the fob of the Three Lugs of Man." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • " Along an infinite invisible tight-rope taut from zenith to nadir the End of the World, a two headed octopus in gillies kilts, busby and tartan filibegs, whirls through the murk, head over heels, in the fob of the Three Lugs of Man." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • " Along an infinite invisible tight-rope taut from zenith to nadir the End of the World, a two headed octopus in gillies kilts, busby and tartan filibegs, whirls through the murk, head over heels, in the fob of the Three Lugs of Man." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "Outside the gramophone begins to blare The Holy City." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "It is susceptible of nodes or modes as far apart as hyperphrygian and mixolydian ..." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "It is susceptible of nodes or modes as far apart as hyperphrygian and mixolydian ..." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "Florry Talbot, a blond feeble goosefat whore in a tatterdemalion gown of mildewed strawberry ..." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "The floor is covered with an oilcloth mosaic of jade and azure and cinnabar rhomboids." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "In babylinen and pelisse, bigheaded, with a caul of dark hair, fixes big eyes on her fluid slip and counts its bronze buckles with a chubby finger, his moist tongue tolling and lisping." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "In caubeen with clay pipe stuck in the band, dusty brogues, an emigrant's red handkerchief bundle in his hand, leading a black bogoak pig by a sugaun, with a smile in his eye." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "In bodycoats, kneebreeches, with Donnybrook fair shillelaghs." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "... readymade suits, porringers of toad in the hole ..." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "... billets doux in the form of cocked hats ..." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "A man in a brown macintosh springs up through a trap-door." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "The former morganatic spouse of Bloom is hastily removed in the Black Maria." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "Bloom holds up his right hand on which sparkles the Koh-i-Noor diamond. His palfrey neighs. " Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "Mirus bazaar fireworks go up from all sides with symbolical phallopyrotechnic designs." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • "(They rustle, flutter upon his garments, alight, bright giddyflecks, silvery sequins.)" Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • Aspergum trademark is currently owned by Insight Pharmaceuticals, the same company that produces the aspirin and caffeine based Anacin. (Wikipedia)

    January 1, 2008

  • For their spirits were broke and their manhood impair'd by foreign vices for exaction. (from Jubilate Agno by Christopher Smart)

    December 31, 2007

  • For this was done in the divine contempt of a general pusillanimity. (from Jubilate Agno by Christopher Smart)

    December 31, 2007

  • For I prophecy that the Reformation will make way in France when Moab is made meek by being well drubbed by the English. (from Jubilate Agno by Christopher Smart)

    December 31, 2007

  • For Red is of sundry sorts till it deepens to BLACK. (from Jubilate Agno by Christopher Smart)

    December 31, 2007

  • For Clapperclaw is in the grappling of the words upon one another in all the modes of versification. (from Jubilate Agno by Christopher Smart)

    December 31, 2007

  • For all the creatures mentiond by Pliny are somewhere or other extant to the glory of God. (from Jubilate Agno by Christopher Smart)

    December 31, 2007

  • For the Poorman's nosegay is an introduction to a Prince. (from Jubilate Agno by Christopher Smart)

    December 31, 2007

  • For flowers are musical in ocular harmony. (from Jubilate Agno by Christopher Smart)

    December 31, 2007

  • For a man cannot have publick spirit, who is void of private benevolence. (from Jubilate Agno by Christopher Smart)

    December 31, 2007

  • For loud prayer is good for weak lungs and for a vitiated throat. (from Jubilate Agno by Christopher Smart)

    December 31, 2007

  • For loud prayer is good for weak lungs and for a vitiated throat. (from Jubilate Agno by Christopher Smart)

    December 31, 2007

  • For my existimation is good even amongst the slanderers and my memory shall arise for a sweet savour unto the Lord. (from Jubilate Agno by Christopher Smart)

    December 31, 2007

  • Let Anaiah bless with the Dragon-fly, who sails over the pond by the wood-side and feedeth on the cressies. (from Jubilate Agno by Christopher Smart)

    December 31, 2007

  • Let Huldah bless with the Silkworm -- the ornaments of the Proud are from the bowells of their Betters. (from Jubilate Agno by Christopher Smart) see bowel, of course

    December 31, 2007

  • For he can spraggle upon waggle at the word of command. (from Christopher Smart's Jubilate Agno)

    December 31, 2007

  • Let Jotham praise with the Urchin, who took up his parable and provided himself for the adversary to kick against the pricks. (from Jubilate Agno by Christopher Smart)

    December 31, 2007

  • Let Anah, the son of Zibion, lead a Mule to the temple, and bless God, who amerces the consolation of the creature for the service of Man. (from Jubilate Agno by Christopher Smart)

    December 31, 2007

  • For, tho he cannot fly, he is an excellent clamberer. (from Christopher Smart's Jubilate Agno)

    December 31, 2007

  • For he can spraggle upon waggle at the word of command. (from Christopher Smart's Jubilate Agno)

    December 31, 2007

  • For he is a mixture of gravity and waggery. (from Christopher Smart's Jubilate Agno)

    December 31, 2007

  • For he rolls upon prank to work it in. from Christopher Smart's Jubilate Agno ... clearly used in a more antique sense ... what is it?

    and also ... Let Anna bless God with the Cat, who is worthy to be presented before the throne of grace, when he has trampled upon the idol in his prank.

    December 31, 2007

  • If you try to say it ... and read the poem ... you might get some sense of it

    December 19, 2007

  • It's more than a spelling error. At least, it is to me ... used in my poem ngork

    December 19, 2007

  • Gracility meaning not “slender and dexterous,�? but “skimpy.�? from Isola di Rifiuti

    November 17, 2007

  • This generation has never heard of "based on". Where does this "off of" come from?

    October 25, 2007

  • Um, okay. Cool, dude. That's a really neat one.

    October 25, 2007

  • i know ... kinda cool, isn't it ... i like this quick access to all the lists

    August 3, 2007

  • wow that's crazy ... never saw that before ... i wonder why it happens that way ...

    August 3, 2007

  • "Empty of everything, in a hum of sempiternal readiness for that soul-wilting, muse-recoiling Jawohl, Herr Kommandant! to shoot up one’s spinal column as quick as a blastula ..." from John Latta's Isola di Rifiuti

    August 3, 2007

  • "Empty of everything, in a hum of sempiternal readiness for that soul-wilting, muse-recoiling Jawohl, Herr Kommandant! to shoot up one’s spinal column as quick as a blastula ..." from John Latta's Isola di Rifiuti

    August 3, 2007

  • "Empty of everything, in a hum of sempiternal readiness for that soul-wilting, muse-recoiling Jawohl, Herr Kommandant! to shoot up one’s spinal column as quick as a blastula ..." from John Latta's Isola di Rifiuti

    August 3, 2007

  • "Such are the vicissitudes of a provincial placist who has rejected the munificence of the 'post-war corporatist-collectivist consensus...'" Robert Cheeks in a review of Look Homeward, America:, In Search of Reactionary Radicals and Front-Porch Anarchists by Bill Kauffman

    July 6, 2007

  • Author of the thunderous ongoing recitatif, the spiv recital, its shill featurettes and occasions... John Latta, Isola di Rifiuti

    June 5, 2007

  • "Isn't God the endpoint of the apophatic project, just as Buddha nature and emptiness is of Buddhist meditation? The season strains toward its apophatic culmination."

    Paula's House of Toast

    February 19, 2007

  • "(He lifts his mutilated ashen face moonwards and bays lugubriously.)"

    Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    February 8, 2007

  • "(He lifts his mutilated ashen face moonwards and bays lugubriously.)"

    Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    February 8, 2007

  • "He rubs grimly his grapping hands, knobbed with knuckledusters."

    Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    February 8, 2007

  • "From his forehead arise starkly the Mosaic ramshorns."

    Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    February 8, 2007

  • "Whereas Leopold Bloom of no fixed abode is a well-known dynamitard, forger, bigamist, bawd and cuckold and a public nuisance to the citizens of Dublin ..."

    Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    February 8, 2007

  • "(The brass quoits of a bed are heard to jingle.)"

    Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    February 8, 2007

  • "I'll dig my spurs in him up to the rowel."

    Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    February 8, 2007

  • "BLOOM (Shuddering, shrinking, joins his hands with hangdog mien.)"

    Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    February 8, 2007

  • "BLOOM (Shuddering, shrinking, joins his hands with hangdog mien.)"

    Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    February 8, 2007

  • "Give him ginger. Thrash the mongrel within an inch of his life. The cat-o' nine-tails. Geld him. Vivisect him."

    Joyce, Ulysses,15

    February 8, 2007

  • "Give him ginger. Thrash the mongrel within an inch of his life. The cat-o' nine-tails. Geld him. Vivisect him."

    Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    February 8, 2007

  • "Refined birching to stimulate the circulation."

    Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    February 8, 2007

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Comments for brtom

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  • brtom, how nice to see you here again. Been a while :-)

    March 25, 2010

  • Hey, check out WordPlay's profile. :)

    February 11, 2007

  • Yes, the listing, and also the citations, they're wonderful. The words are so much richer when shown in context.

    December 16, 2006

  • Yeah, after looking at your LibraryThing and homepage I saw that. Neat stuff. More of a prose man myself. Anyway, keep up the listing as I'm enjoying it. ^_^

    December 3, 2006

  • no no... yr good ... & i'm an english teacher ... and i write obscure pomes at http://brtom.typepad.com/one/

    December 3, 2006

  • Oh, my bad. Imploded heads are rarely any good. I was just curious if you did any amateur or professional work in fiction since I liked the sometimes surreal definitions from the list.

    That better?

    December 3, 2006

  • a writer? ... must be ... if ... but you pose a ... my head is ... imploding ... a savage parlor ... sorry

    December 3, 2006

  • Really enjoying your imaginary words list, although I'd argue that if you're writing them they're not imaginary.

    Are you a writer?

    December 3, 2006