Old-Fashioned Fruitcake
It’s always good to discover a word for something you know about but have always had to describe in the past, for want of knowing its name.
While working on the third draft of The Wound of Words, I discovered the word girandole. A girandole is a sort of decorative multi-branched candleholding apparatus, frequently wall-mounted rather than ceiling mounted (as with chandeliers), and sometimes backed with mirror for extra light-shedding and sparkliness.
The SOD describes horror as “a painful emotion compounded of loathing and fear; a shuddering with terror and repugnance; the feeling excited by something shocking or frightful.” Doesn’t sound that enjoyable, does it? And yet horror is a remarkably popular genre, in film, TV, and of course, ye olde book.
What’s your position? Are you keen on horripilant entertainment?
What word can mean a thin cream of clay, a cutting from a tree, a woman’s undergarment, a boat-landing, a greyhound’s leash, a pillow-case, a cricket position or a mistake – among other meanings?