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Apr 18, 2016

This week’s theme
Words coined by Lewis Carroll

This week’s words
galumph
slithy
chortle
bandersnatch
frabjous

Lewis Carroll, a self-portrait, c. 1856

Photo: Wikimedia

A.Word.A.Day

with Anu Garg

Odds are higher that you’d win a lottery or be struck by lightning than that you’d coin a word that becomes a part of the language (but that’s not a reason to not coin a word).

It’s rare that a word someone coins goes on to grace the pages of a dictionary. What about multiple words coined by a person? What if those words were in a single work? Well, anything is possible if your name is Lewis Carroll.

This week we’ll look at words coined by Lewis Carroll in his poem “Jabberwocky” that was part of his 1871 novel Through the Looking-Glass The title of the poem itself is a coined word and has become a word in the English language.

galumph

PRONUNCIATION:

(guh-LUMF)

MEANING:

verb intr.: To move clumsily or heavily.

ETYMOLOGY:

Coined by Lewis Carroll in his 1871 novel Through the Looking-Glass A blend of gallop + triumph.

USAGE:

“It was excruciating, watching him galumph around the floor in a giraffe-skin patterned leotard.”
Matt Butler; It’s a 10 for Mediocrity; The Independent (London, UK); Sep 15, 2014.

See more usage examples of galumph in Vocabulary.com’s dictionary.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:

You can only protect your liberties in this world by protecting the other man's freedom. You can only be free if I am free. -Clarence Darrow, lawyer and author (18 Apr 1857-1938)

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