A.Word.A.Day --voluble

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Jan 13, 2014

This week's theme
Words to describe people

This week's words
voluble
intransigent
potentate
sophist
solicitous

A.Word.A.Day

with Anu Garg

It takes all kinds to make the world and it shows in this week's selection of words. For the next five days we'll see words to describe people of various persuasions. These are people you may meet at work or on a train, in a park or in the house next door -- almost anywhere on earth.

Here's a fun exercise for you: find at least one person epitomizing the day's word, every day this week. With some seven billion of us around there can't be any excuse for insufficient data.

voluble

PRONUNCIATION:

(VOL-yuh-buhl)

MEANING:

adjective: Speaking incessantly or fluently.

ETYMOLOGY:

Via French, from Latin volvere (to roll). Ultimately from the Indo-European root wel- (to turn or roll), which also gave us waltz, revolve, valley, walk, vault, volume, wallet, and helix. Earliest documented use: 1575.

USAGE:

"As Mr Barroso, a voluble sort, talked about strong transatlantic relationships and the like, Mr Obama gazed stony-faced at his shoes."
A Surfeit of Leaders; The Economist (London, UK); Apr 8, 2009.

See more usage examples of voluble in Vocabulary.com's dictionary.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:

Several excuses are always less convincing than one. -Aldous Huxley, novelist (1894-1963)

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