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Dec 3, 2019
This week’s theme
Illustrated words

This week’s words
fulgor
inquiline
jouissance
worricow
hyaloid

inquiline
Illustration: Leah Palmer Preiss

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A.Word.A.Day
with Anu Garg

inquiline

PRONUNCIATION:
(IN-kwuh-lyn)

MEANING:
noun: An animal living in the nest, burrow, or home of another.

ETYMOLOGY:
From Latin inquilinus (tenant, lodger), from in- (into) + colere (to dwell). Earliest documented use: 1640.

USAGE:
“That he has never allowed himself to be absorbed fully into the English tradition is something many critics have misunderstood. Naipaul is best understood as an inquiline, as a man whom the English have tried to absorb, but a man who has clung to displacement like a floating buoy.”
The Voyage in -- A Way in the World by V.S. Naipaul; The New Republic (Washington, DC); Jun 13, 1994.

“In ‘Talent’ a young English girl worms her way into the life of a Fifth Avenue extended family with theatrical and musical connections. Since they are dysfunctional, and don’t communicate with each other, they are unaware of what exactly the girl, Ellie, is up to. So when this inert inquiline turns up repeatedly at one of the family houses and sits in silence, nobody asks her to depart.”
Patrick French; East Is West; Financial Times (London, UK); Oct 1, 2011.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
A story should have a beginning, a middle, and an end, but not necessarily in that order. -Jean-Luc Godard, film director (b. 3 Dec 1930)

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