Vocabulary Week 1
1. Banal - adj. commonplace; trite; stale from overuse
2. Bellicose - adj. quarrelsome; hostile; inclined to fighting
3. Finesse - n. delicate skill; subtlety; v. to bring about will skill; to evade
4. Glib - adj. done in a smooth, offhand manner; easily spoken; speaking too smoothly to be sincere.
5. Lampoon - n. strongly satirical writing; v. to ridicule or satirize
6. Lugubrious - adj. sad or mournful, often to an exaggerated degree; doleful
7. Nefarious - adj. villainous; infamous; having a bad reputation
8. Nemesis - n. an avenger; an unbeatable rival; a person who punishes another for evil deeds
9. Pseudonym - n. a fictitious name assumed by an author; a pen name
10. Purloin - v. to steal
11. Beginning
12. Business
13. Convenience
14. Carrier
15. Ignorance
16. they’re
17. their
18. there
19. It’s all right.
20. Its appearance
Vocabulary Practice Week 1
1. One of the greatest British poets was Alexander Pope, whose ______with the English language is legendary. Few others have used words with such proficiency.
2. One of Pope’s most famous poems is “The Rape of the Lock”, a ______that makes fun of the petty daily lives of eighteenth-century English aristocracy.
3. The title of the poem refers to the theft of a lock of hair, which an adventurous young man ______from the fair Belinda.
4. The action in the poem is based on an actual event. Pope wrote the poem, in part, to ridicule the people involved, who treated the ______, insignificant event as a major crisis.
5. Pope himself was a fascinating individual. He was a literary success, yet he was often ______; his sorrow and depression led him to refer to his life as a “long disease.”
6. Pope was also ______. He frequently attacked his contemporaries in his writings, often with great vigor and always with great skill.
7. Those who suffered from his attacks considered Pope to be vicious, even ______. They called him the “Wicked Wasp of Twickenham,” after the villa in which he lived.
8. To his victims, Pope was a ______; his wit made him unbeatable.
9. Pope’s pride in his work is revealed by the fact that he never used a ______but always published under his own name.
10. Today we ______use the expressions “To err is human, to forgive, divine,” “Hope springs eternal in the human breast,” and “For fools rush in where angels fear to tread.” If you look these quotations up, you’ll find that they are from Alexander Pope.
Banal Bellicose Finesse Glib Pseudonym
Lampoon Lugubrious Nefarious Nemesis Purloin
Practice
1. Finesse
2. Lampoon
3. Purloins
4. Banal
5. Lugubrious
6. Bellicose
7. Nefarious
8. Nemesis
9. Pseudonym
10. glibly