Tulgey - Make Your Point

I still have flashbacks to freshman year, of wandering in a tulgey wood of chemical equations. "The jabberwocks of historical and antiquarian research burble in the tulgey wood of conjecture, flitting from one tum-tum tree to another." — J. R. R. Tolkien, Proceedings of the British Academy, 1936

study it:

Explain the meaning of "tulgey" without saying "murky" or "caliginous."

try it out:

Fill in the blank: "I hacked through the tulgey prose of (some author or publication)." Example: "I hacked through the tulgey prose of the IRS 1040 instruction 'booklet.'"

before you review, play:

Spend 20 seconds or more on the game below. Don’t skip straight to the review—let your working memory empty out first. Our game is "TV Tropes!" This month, we're playing with tropes from TVTropes.org. TV tropes are storytelling devices, which can come from any source of fiction—TV, movies, books, you name it. They're the archetypes, the story patterns, the plot devices, the cheap tricks, the situational clichés that we see over and over throughout fiction. Examples of TV tropes include "Skyward Scream," "Banister Slide," "Caught on the Jumbotron," "Burp of Finality," "City People Eat Sushi," "Dance Party Ending," "Clean Pretty Childbirth," "Come Back to Bed, Honey," "Even the Subtitler is Stumped," and tens of thousands more. Naming a trope can be a straightforward business, as in the "Skyward Scream." But often it demands precision, inviting the use of humorously sophisticated terms. Enter our Make Your Point words. In each issue this month, consider the name of a TV trope, and try to define it or even give an example from a TV show or other work of fiction. From the previous issue: In fiction, what is the trope known as the Extreme Omnivore? Answer: It's when a character will eat anything, ad absurdum, even if it's not food. For example, in Animaniacs, Wakko once ate a light bulb. Try this today: In fiction, what is the trope known as the Abhorrent Admirer?

review today's word:

1. A close opposite of TULGEY is A. LACKADAISICAL. B. LILLIPUTIAN. C. LUMINOUS. 2. He penned tulgey predictions like "_____." A. We gonna light it up like it's dynamite B. Two brothers [will be] torn apart by Chaos while the fortress endures C. The temperature will decrease by 5.4 degrees Fahrenheit for every 1,000 feet you ascend Answers are below.

a final word:

Make Your Point is crafted with love and brought to you each weekday morning by Liesl Johnson, a reading and writing tutor on a mission to explore, illuminate, and celebrate words. From Liesl's blog: 36 ways to study words. Why we forget words, & how to remember them. How to use sophisticated words without being awkward. To be a sponsor and include your ad in an issue, please contact me at [email protected].