A.Word.A.Day --turveydropian

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Today's Word

Turveydropian

PRONUNCIATION:

(tuhr-vee-DROH-pee-uhn)

MEANING:

adjective: Overly concerned with one’s appearance, demeanor, etc.

ETYMOLOGY:

After Mr. Turveydrop, a character overly concerned with deportment, in Charles Dickens’s Bleak House, 1852. Earliest documented use: 1876.

NOTES:

Mr. Turveydrop is a dance studio owner. He’s a conceited humbug, consumed with his deportment. As Dickens describes him:

He was a fat old gentleman with a false complexion, false teeth, false whiskers, and a wig. He had a fur collar.

Turveydrop laments:

England -- alas, my country! -- has degenerated very much, and is degenerating every day. She has not many gentlemen left.

He has named his son Prince (after prince regent) and says this about him:

Heaven forbid that I should disparage my dear child, but he has -- no deportment.

USAGE:

“The drawing-room door is flung wide open, and Dorking, the butler, entering with Turveydropian deportment, announces, ‘Mr. Saville.’”
Cecil Dunstan; Quita: A Novel; Ward and Downey; 1891.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:

The absence of flaw in beauty is itself a flaw. -Havelock Ellis, physician, writer, and social reformer (2 Feb 1859-1939)

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