Word of the Day
Monday, April 9, 2007
Ostracize (transitive verb) – To shun or shut out, to banish or exclude from a group (In medieval days, the concept of exile was horrific to the thanes or “knights” who served their lords; to be separated from their king was a fate worse than death. There are some awesome Old English poems about exile, and if I can find my OE poetry book, I’ll post one for you guys. It’s great heart-wrenching stuff.) (from Greek ostrakizein, which, strangely enough, means shard – the story behind this word is an Athenian citizen used a shell/shard (ostrakon) to vote to ostracize another citizen – the Anglo-Saxons would have empathized with the banished guy)
Word in a Sentence: In my novel Choices Meant for Gods, Godric’s reasons for ostracizing Nigel from the rest of the Taiman family for nearly twenty-eight years are self-centered and bordering on bigotry.
Your turn! To those of you new to The Dragon, each day, you’re invited to come up with a sentence of your own with the Word of the Day. Click on the comment link below and let us see what heart-wrenching, exclusionary sentences can you come up with today. Jeni, if you’re on today, show ’em how it’s done, Baby!
“Some days, I just want the dragon to win.”
Tags: Choices Meant for Gods, Sandy Lender, grammar, word, Old English, Anglo-Saxon, exile
Monday, April 9, 2007
Ostracize (transitive verb) – To shun or shut out, to banish or exclude from a group (In medieval days, the concept of exile was horrific to the thanes or “knights” who served their lords; to be separated from their king was a fate worse than death. There are some awesome Old English poems about exile, and if I can find my OE poetry book, I’ll post one for you guys. It’s great heart-wrenching stuff.) (from Greek ostrakizein, which, strangely enough, means shard – the story behind this word is an Athenian citizen used a shell/shard (ostrakon) to vote to ostracize another citizen – the Anglo-Saxons would have empathized with the banished guy)
Word in a Sentence: In my novel Choices Meant for Gods, Godric’s reasons for ostracizing Nigel from the rest of the Taiman family for nearly twenty-eight years are self-centered and bordering on bigotry.
Your turn! To those of you new to The Dragon, each day, you’re invited to come up with a sentence of your own with the Word of the Day. Click on the comment link below and let us see what heart-wrenching, exclusionary sentences can you come up with today. Jeni, if you’re on today, show ’em how it’s done, Baby!
“Some days, I just want the dragon to win.”
Tags: Choices Meant for Gods, Sandy Lender, grammar, word, Old English, Anglo-Saxon, exile
posted by Sandy Lender | 6:05 AM
2 Comments:
Some days, when I get hit from behind with a dose of PMS, I feel as though I have been ostracized and other times, I wonder if perhaps I may just ostracize myself and that's the cause of some of my issues and depression. Who knows?
Jeni,
One of the 926,752 joys of being a writer is you can hide the whole PMS issue very nicely with "get out, I'm writing," and no one is any the wiser. Are you merely hiding out or are you PMSing...only the shadow knows...
:)
Sandy L.
"Some days, I just want the dragon to win."
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