Word of the Day
blossom
verb
to flourish; develop: a writer of commercial jingles who blossomed out into an important composer.
More about blossom
Blossom in both the noun and the verb senses dates back to Old English. The Old English verb 产濒艒蝉迟尘颈补苍 鈥渢o bloom, blossom, effloresce鈥� is a derivative of the noun 产濒艒蝉迟尘, 产濒艒蝉迟尘a, 产濒艒蝉尘补 鈥渂lossom, flower.鈥� The English words blossom, bloom, and blow (鈥渁 yield or display of blossoms鈥�) are all Germanic derivatives of the Proto-Indo-European root bhel-, 产丑濒脓-, 产丑濒艒– (and other variants) 鈥渢o thrive, bloom.鈥� In Latin the root appears in 蹿濒艒蝉 (inflectional stem 蹿濒艒谤-) 鈥渇lower鈥� (which via Old French yields English flower, flour, and flourish). English florescent comes straight from Latin 蹿濒艒谤escent-, the inflectional stem of 蹿濒艒谤esc膿ns, the present participle of 蹿濒艒谤escere 鈥渢o come into bloom.鈥� Other English derivatives from Latin include floral and folium 鈥渓eaf,鈥� which becomes, again through Old French, English foil. Greek has the noun 辫丑媒濒濒辞苍 鈥渓eaf,鈥� whose most common English derivative is probably chlorophyll.
how is blossom used?
… the beauty of their island only blossomed the further through time they moved away from it.
This bit of utilitarian Web ephemera [the hashtag], invented with functionality squarely in mind, has听blossomed听into听a marvelous and underappreciated literary device.
camp
noun
something that provides sophisticated, knowing amusement, as by virtue of its being artlessly mannered or stylized, or self-consciously artificial and extravagant.
More about camp
Many explanations have been offered, but the etymology of听camp听“something that provides sophisticated, knowing amusement, as by virtue of its being artlessly mannered or stylized, or self-consciously artificial and extravagant” remains obscure. The term听entered English in the early 1900s.
how is camp used?
Indeed the essence of Camp is its love of the unnatural: of artifice and exaggeration.
From 鈥淩uPaul鈥檚 Drag Race鈥� to the current celebration of all things Warhol and听Banksy鈥檚 self-destructing painting, Mr. Bolton sees the explosion of camp as a partial riposte to the corresponding rise of extreme conservatism and populism.
More about wilder
The rare, archaic verb wilder 鈥渢o lead astray鈥� is pronounced with a short –i– as in children, not a long –i– as in child. The etymology of wilder is difficult: it looks like a frequentative verb formed from the adjective wild, or an irregular derivative from wilderness that was influenced by wander. Wilder entered English in the early 17th century.
how is wilder used?
Many an older head than his has been wildered by that fatal uniformity, that endless wilderness of green, those seeming tracks, which only lead deeper and deeper into the heart of the deadly scrub.
… in such a manner as to wilder the soul into vast and unthought-of horrors.