Know your English

“Horrendous (B. Joseph, Kurnool)”

“Horrendous means ‘dreadful’, ‘frightful’. It is a colloquial word.

It was a horrendous sight.

‘Horrible’ is the word that is generally used to mean ‘frightful.’

It was a horrible sight.

‘Horrible’ is also used to mean ‘very unpleasant’.

The food was horrible.

‘Horrid’ means ‘horrible,’ but is a stronger word.

I cannot stir out in this horrid weather.

‘Horrific’ means ‘causing horror.’

It was a horrific murder.

Once ‘horrific’ was a bookish term. Now it is used in informal contexts.”

“Cock and bull story (N. Rajasekhar, Fertilizer City)”

“A ‘cock and bull story’ is ‘an absurd, improbable story, especially one used as an excuse or an explanation’.

Don’t tell me these cock and bull stories. I know why you did not turn up yesterday.

Cocks, bulls, foxes, crows and other creatures converse in old fables. Their conversation is amusing, but everyone knows that it is imaginary, not real. From the fables, we get the expression ‘cock and bull story.’”

“Bill as verb (K. K. Sanyal, Calcutta)” “‘Bill’ is used as a verb also. It means ‘to send a bill’.

He has billed me for the books I bought last week.

‘To bill as’ means ‘to advertise in printed notices.’ It is used generally in the passive.

She is billed to appear as Sakuntala in the play.”

“Absquatulate (V. V. Srinivasan, Madras)”

“‘Absquatulate’ means ‘to squat,’ ‘to decamp.’ It is a jocular expression used in America and is a combination of

‘abscond’ and ‘squat.’”

“Cooperate or cooperate? (V. Raghunathan, Madras)”

“Both spellings are acceptable. The tendency these days is to write the word without the hyphen. The main entry in the latest edition of COD is ‘cooperate’. It says within brackets ‘also cooperate.’ The same is true of cooperation, cooperative. But it is always ‘coopt’ and never

‘coopt’.”

“Nitpicking

Jodhpur)”

“‘Nitpicking’ means ‘finding fault in a petty way.’ A nit is ‘the egg or young form of a house insect or other parasitic insect especially of human head lice or body lice.’ It is a laborious task removing nits from the head or body of an infected person. You have to remove them one by one. From this we get the expression which means ‘to find fault in a petty way.’

He is a nitpicker. Don’t worry about his comments.”

Published in The Hindu on August 27, 1991. (S. C. Bannerjee,