Tricky words and phrases in books

[ESquared]

Here are some words and phrases from a book I'm reading which I didn't know, or which I recognized and knew from context but might have struggled to properly define. Some I still don't know the meaning of. I hid meanings behind links for those who wish to ponder at leisure.

• "treat myself to a small marc." - context is alcohol.
• Do you know what an English Oval is? I think it's a reference to a cigar.
• "an imbroglio at one of our boîtes." - French for boxes but must mean parties or something similar.

• "hoping mens sana in corpore sano really applied to me but with a lurking suspicion I flunked the sano part." (italics in original)
• vesti la guibba (possibly giubba) - an aria from I Pagliacci (?) by Andre Kostelanetz. Anyone have a link to download the song or a snippet of it?
• "Rather grotty, don't you think?"
• "The nous was astir and I was eager to bring my diary up to date."
• "Did they have a veiled motive I wot not of?"
• "If I was being played as the schnook du jour by a gang of slyboots."


-------------------------------------
Peace is not the absence of an external activity called conflict. It is the presence of an internal activity called unity.
- Erik E

 

[SantaMufasa]

Erik,

You can try these links. I cannot confirm for you here which links are "for fee" or require other special downloading behaviours:

http://songs.streamwaves.com/v/ves/vestilaguibbafromipagliacci/index.html

http://www.dailytunes.com/songs/20031029095552.html

Let us know what you find.

Mufasa
(aka Dave of Sandy, Utah, USA)

http://www.dasages.com

Do you use Oracle and live or work in Utah, USA?
Then click here to join Utah Oracle Users Group on Tek-Tips.

 

[tsdragon]

What book are you reading that mixes expressions from American English, English, Latin, French, Italian and Yiddish?

"Schnook du jour"!!!


Tracy Dryden

Meddle not in the affairs of dragons,
For you are crunchy, and good with mustard.

 

[ESquared]

McNally's Puzzle by Lawrence Sanders

It's not my most-frequented genre, but my father reads almost exclusively spy, murder, mystery, and the like, and he recommended it to me. The book itself isn't sooooooo fantastic but all the words have been fun (which is why he recommended it). I have almost twenty more pages dog-eared to mark words and phrases to look up. Perhaps I'll enter them here.

 

[tsdragon]

My daughter does something similar. When she's reading she keeps a sheet of paper handy and writes down words she wants to look up. She was reading Edgar Allen Poe and had a list of about 30 words. I bought her a MW dictionary for Christmas that year to help. Unfortunately, I should have bought a much bigger, unabridged dictionary. Only about one out of ten words she had written down from Poe was even in the dictionary. Of course, they were some pretty obscure words. I wish I had a list of them now.


Tracy Dryden

Meddle not in the affairs of dragons,
For you are crunchy, and good with mustard.