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Jan 27, 2009
This week's themeLatin terms in English This week's words ex libris in medias res dramatis personae lares and penates ex parte Got a website? Free content for your site words, quotations & more 
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with Anu Gargin medias res
PRONUNCIATION:
(in MAY-dee-uhs rays, in MEE-dee-uhs REEZ, in MAY-dee-as RAYS)
MEANING:
adverb:
In or into the middle of things.
ETYMOLOGY:
From Latin in medias res, from in (in, into) + medius (middle) + res (thing).
A related term is ab ovo (from the beginning, literally, from the egg).
Both come from Horace's Ars Poetica (Art of Poetry), where the Roman poet
advises that an epic poem ought to begin in the middle of the action
rather than at the beginning. The story is then told by flashbacks.
USAGE:
"The story begins in medias res, with Shay dead and Hano and Katie on the
run after an unspecified but obviously grave crime."Terrence Rafferty; New Dubliners; The New York Times; Apr 20, 2008. A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
The world is mud-luscious ... puddle-wonderful. -E.E. Cummings, poet (1894-1962)
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