word of the day: obsequy

The word of the day is obsequy:

 

noun, plural obsequies. Usually, obsequies

1. a funeral rite or ceremony.

< Late Latin obsequiae, alteration (by confusion with exsequiae funeral rites) of obsequia, plural of Latin obsequium (dictionary.com)


"The implicit comparisons recur in Italy, where the men visit the towns in which the sexual outlaws Byron and Shelley lived, shortly before their deaths.  The comics perform funerary obsequies for the poets and again recite in their own and others' voices.  'The Trip to Italy', for all its japes, is haunted by mortality, as was its namesake, 'Viaggio in Italia' (1954), the Rosselini masterpiece starring George Sanders and Ingrid Bergman as a warring couple dismally on tour.  Like them, Coogan and Brydon visit the museum at Pompeii, with its plaster casts of the bodies of the dead.  Rosselini showed us a couple who died locked in embrace when Vesuvius exploded, a harsh reflection on the modern couple's marital anguish.  Here, in a blasphemous reduction, Brydon summons his man-in-a-box voice to play a Pompeian lying in a glass case; the two carry on a discreet gay flirtation.  It's not that the end is nigh for these men, but death, for them and for Winterbottom, is always present in life."

 - David Denby, "Lasting impressions: 'The Trip to Italy'", 1 September 2014 The New Yorker

word of the day: dyspeptic

The word of the day is dyspeptic:

adjective

1. pertaining to, subject to, or suffering from dyspepsia.

2. gloomy, pessimistic, and irritable.

peptikós pertaining to digestion (dictionary.com)

"In the 'Trip' films, playing a version of himself, he's intelligent and dyspeptic, a man too clever to live by illusions but too ambitious to give them up.  He's dissatisfied with everything - his career, his relationship with his children, his waning sexual attractiveness - and he takes it out on his friend."

 - David Denby, "Lasting impressions: 'The Trip to Italy'", 1 September 2014 The New Yorker 

word of the day: sally

The word of the day is sally:

noun

1. a sortie of troops from a besieged place upon an enemy.

2. a sudden rushing forth or activity.

3. an excursion or trip, usually off the main course.

4. an outburst or flight of passion, fancy, etc.:

5. a clever, witty, or fanciful remark.

6. Carpentry. a projection, as of the end of a rafter beyond the notch by which the rafter is fitted over the wall plate.

< Middle French saillie attack, noun use of feminine past participle of saillir to rush forward < Latin salīre to leap (dictionary.com)

"The pace almost equals that of Robin Williams doing standup, but Coogan and Brydon reprise their best sallies for rhythm and for emphasis, so you won't miss anything that matters."

 - David Denby, "Lasting impressions: 'The Trip to Italy'", 1 September 2014 The New Yorker