Post by Mike LOn Mon, 12 Mar 2012 13:42:31 -0700 (PDT), retrosorter
Post by retrosorterPost by Peter Duncanson (BrE)Post by the OmrudPost by Killer InstinctI have seen it as the subject of a joke, but is there such a word as
"gruntled"?
- He spoke with a certain what-is-it in his voice, and I could see that,
if not actually disgruntled, he was far from being gruntled.
The OED defines "gruntled" without labelling it as jocular. However, in
my experience it is not nearly as widely used and accepted without
calling attention to itself as is "disgruntled".
Post by the OmrudPost by Killer InstinctIf not then is there seriously any way of writing "I am not disgruntled"
without using a double negative?
Well, clearly, if "gruntled" is not a word then "disgruntled" is not a
negative and "not disgruntled" is not a double negative.
How about "contented", "satisfied", "uncritical"?
The OED defines it as "pleased, satisfied, contented."
--
Peter Duncanson, UK
(in alt.usage.english)
I don't regard gruntled as a very ept word.
I find it rather gusting, if not actually iquitous. Didn't most of us
play this game as students?
--
Mike.- Hide quoted text -
- Show quoted text -
And spoke of it here 14 years ago, it seems....
<snip>
Post by Mike LThe Society for the Preservation of Tithesis commends your
ebriated and scrutable use of delible and defatigable, which
are gainly, sipid and couth. We are gruntled and consolate
that you have the ertia and eptitude to choose such putably
pensible tithesis, which we parage.
Just for fun, let's see how many of these "coinages" are actually
formed by
a sawing-off of a negative prefix and how many just seem to be.
"couth": fine. It literally means "well known"; originally "uncouth"
meant
"unknown" and then drifted into its present meaning of "unmannerly"
(consider "unheard-of behavior").
"gruntle": nope. The "dis-" sawed off here is not a negative "dis-"
but the
"dis-" that means "apart". Here, in fact, it's an intensifier.
"kempt": fine. It's an archaic past participle of "comb"; "unkempt"
is
literally "uncombed".
"shevel": hard to say; probably not. Again, "dis-" here means
"apart".
"gust": fine.
"may": maybe, but not for the reason it looks like. "Dis-" here is an
intensifier as in "disgruntle", but originally the word comes from
"dis-"
plus Vulgar Latin "exmagare". If all you're left with at the end is
"may",
the "ex-" must have been taken off as well - and that _is_ negative.
"tithesis": no way. While "antithesis" certainly has a negative
prefix,
it's "anti-", not "an-". And "thesis" is a real word.
"ebriated": uh-uh. The "in-" in "inebriated" is an intensifier, not a
negative.
"scrutable": fine; in fact, it's in the AHD.
"delible": okay.
"defatigable": fine.
"gainly": also in the AHD.
"sipid": the "in-" is a negative prefix, all right, but when
unprefixed the
vowel expands back to its full value. It should be "sapid", which is
a
word.
"consolate": okay.
"ertia": like "insipid", the vowel changed when prefixed. Ought to be
"artia".
"eptitude": similarly, "ineptitude" is actually the opposite of
"aptitude".
"putably": not really. This is "dis-" meaning "apart" in the sense of
"different".
"pensible": nope. "Dis-" means "apart" in "dispensible".
"parage": fine, surprisingly. "Disparage" originally meant "deprive
of
rank"; "parage" ("peerage") is "rank".
-Aaron J. Dinkin
Dr. Whom