1984 Section 1-2 Vocab Flashcards
(20 cards)
Furtively
def. stealthily / “The pen was an archaic instrument, seldom used even for signatures, and he had procured one, furtively and with some difficulty…”
Strident
def. characterized by harsh, insistent, and discordant sound / “The telescreen had changed over to strident military music.”
Interminable
def. seemingly endless / “All he had to do was to transfer to paper the interminable restless mono- logue that had been running inside his head…”
Nebulous
def. vague / “It had happened that morning at the Ministry, if anything so nebulous could be said to happen.”
Lucid
def. clear to the understanding / “In a lucid moment Winston found that he was shouting with the others…”
Tremulous
def. trembling / “With a tremulous murmur that sounded like ‘My Saviour!’ she ex- tended her arms towards the screen.”
Dissemble
def. to hide under a false appearance / “To dissemble your feelings, to control your face, to do what everyone else was doing…”
Mutability
def. prone to change / “The sacred principles of Ingsoc. Newspeak, doublethink, the mutability of the past.”
Reproach
def. an expression of disapproval / “There was no reproach either in their faces or in their hearts, only the knowledge that they must die in order that he might remain alive, and that this was part of the unavoid-
able order of things.”
Inscrutable
def. not readily investigated, interpreted, or understood / “…O’Brien’s face was as inscrutable as everybody else’s.”
Din
def. a loud continued noise / “It was merely a few words of encouragement, the sort of words that are uttered in the din of battle…”
Posterity
def. ancestors / “They were executed, and their fate was recorded in the Party histories, a warning to posterity.”
Shirking
def. to bail / “It was perhaps not more dangerous than shirking an evening at the Centre.”
Impenetrable
def. can’t be breached / “…an almost equally enormous woman, presumably his wife, who seemed to form an impenetrable wall of flesh.”
Extricate
def. to free from an entaglement or difficulty / “She need not have told him that. But for the moment they could not extricate themselves from the crowd.”
Infallible
def. incabale of error / “But since in reality Big Brother is not omnipotent and the party is not infallible…”
Counterpane
def. bedspread / “…smelling room that seemed half filled by a bed with a white counterpane.
Feral
def. becoming wild, and beast like / “One minute more, and the feral roars of rage were again bursting from the crowd.”
Inimical
def. being adverse often by reason of hostility / “It includes the power of not grasping analogies, of failing to perceive logi- cal errors, of misunderstanding the simplest arguments if they are inimical to Ingsoc…”
Indefatigable
def. can’t be fatigued / “The indefati- gable voice sang on:…”
