I've Written Down Some Excellent Words, For Your Pleasure

*Julie Andrews voice* These are a few of my favorite words!

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I have more than my fair share of annoying habits. Peccadillos if you will. For example, I often find myself correcting people’s pronunciation of words. As I said, a very annoying habit. Most of the time, it just comes out of my mouth, with no intermediate thought process to filter it out. Worst of all my little tic doesn’t help anyone. Generally, everyone can still understand what’s going on without my interference. I just correct to correct. So, mea culpa if I’ve ever annoyed you in that way.

Part of this habit comes from my love of words. I firmly believe that, despite how much I mangle it in this here newsletter, the English language is beautiful. A wonderful, mysterious, mélange of languages from around the world. A confounding grammatical mess and a vehicle for some of the most beautiful poetry on Earth. Like many languages, it lives, constantly evolving, changing, and turning into something new. I can’t get enough of it. Especially words. While I like a well-written sentence or a smaller phoneme as much as the next person, individual words capture my attention far more. They are the building blocks of sonnets, essays, tweets, graffiti. I love not just the shades of meaning words bring, but their mouth-feel, the way they sound when you say them. “Ten-dollar words,” slang, whatever, they all provide spice to our day-to-day lives. A good word is hard to beat.

Words describe the world around us. If we want to get really theoretical, without words, the truth would not exist. Of course, some people say that words only serve to hide the truth, to mediate between the too raw reality of the world, and our own meager understanding of it, but I just don’t buy that. Without words, we would not understand the world around us. Words elucidate, they matter. I don’t mean that in the sense that vague liberal bromides about how “words matter,” mean it. Words have power over the way we think, what we do, and how we make our way through the world around us. In fact, I can only have this specific thought at this specific time because of words. Everyone should strive to learn as many “big words” or whatever as they can. The more that we can describe our reality in the infinite sensorium in which it exists, the better.

So, for your reading pleasure, here are ten of my favorite words.

Gelid – I’ve seen this a lot in Steven Erikson’s Malazan series. The man simply loves to use “gelid.” It means really cold, or icy, which is very much how I feel when I say it. My first thought would be to pronounce this with a hard G, but according to online it’s “Jel-ed.” That doesn’t change my feeling about the word though. It’s a saucy one, full of verve and more than a little pizzaz. Sounds like someone who has just come back from climbing Mt. Everest. Very cool.

Defenestration – This word has been in my lexicon since I learned about the not one, but TWO, Defenestrations of Prague. Some people say that three defenestrations occured, but in my opinion, the 1483 one does not count. This word comes to the US via France. “Fenêtre” means window in French. Defenestration refers to throwing someone out of the window. I don’t get the chance to use this one all that much, unless I really force it into a conversation. I’m big enough to admit that I have done that before. Great word.

Etiolate – Now we’re cooking with gas. Etiolate neither looks nor sounds like what it means, a rarity among words. This word just does not have good vibes, one of the reasons why I like it so much. It means pale or bleached, with undertones of death and feebleness. It’s also pronounced “e-de-a-late.” This word should mean like, “to cut up” or “slice thin.” That just makes sense. But etiolate does not play by the rules. Etiolate does whatever the hell it wants to. A banger of a word.

Hirsute – This one means “hairy,” usually when talking about someone’s chest. One could apply it to other nouns of course. I think I learned this word when my uncle made fun of me, though I could have made that up. Memory remains a fickle thing. I like hirsute because it feels very bougie. You could just say “hairy,” and get your point across, but “hirsute” really gives it some extra oomph.

Myrmidons – I got reminded of this word while reading a book entitled Gnomon – another great word! – the other day. It comes from the name of a group of people in the Ancient Greek mythos, but it currently means a follower or subordinate. It carries the additional connotation of being a follower that does the dirty work, a sin-eater of sorts, allowing their master to keep their hands clean in the eyes of the public.

Puissant – In The Scar China Miéville uses this word a lot, in case you need a reason to read that novel. A great word, especially useful for writing fantasy novels, or for describing the smell of overripe French cheese. It just means “powerful,” but it sounds like a very powerful way of saying powerful. I imagine casting a spell feels like saying puissant.

Chthonic – This is a newer word, first used in the late 1880s, but it’s a great one. If you call someone or something chthonic you are basically calling them the devil, but like the Devil in a HP Lovecraft novel. A very Greek underworld word. It seems like it would present some difficulty in the realm of pronunciation, but just chop off that first “ch” and you’re good to go. Smoking that chthonic bubonic chronic, y’know.

Reprobate – This one is just fun to say. It means like a criminal, in particular a criminal who cannot be reformed, but that’s not the fun part. The fun part comes from saying it. Rep-pro-bate. Tell me that just doesn’t feel rich coming off the tongue. You can’t. Like a smooth, fat, piece of silk just dripping off your lips. Delicious. Just imagine whispering that into a Vaseline-smeared camera lens.

Epitome – Black Star (Yasiin Bey and Talib Kweli) once rapped “Consider me the entity within the industry / without a history of spitting’ the epitome, of stupidity” on their song “Definition. Epitome is a great word, not just for showing up in that song, but because of the plosives. It really pops. You can really load up on the “pit” syllable. Spit that bad boy out. Throw it in someone’s face. Now that’s a fun word.

Zephyr – A lot of the words I’ve chosen for this little article have their roots in Ancient Greek. Certainly, not all cool words in English have Greek history but some of the best do. I guess the dad in My Big Fat Greek Wedding knew his stuff. It’s an excusable mistake to think that a zephyr refers to an instrument, or perhaps a large inflatable blimp. It’s not. A zephyr is a gentle breeze, usually from the west. Merriam-Webster is also telling me that it can refer to a lightweight fabric or article of clothing. You learn something new every day.

Well, those are some words. Treat yourself to them. They’re free and fun! A combo that is hard to beat. You won’t sound pretentious, I promise. Happy New Year!

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