Wordie: Ephemeral: Comments

Comment by knitandpurl, 7 months ago

Wed, 05 Mar 2008 02:27:54 +0000

"I felt it in the little square that lay in front of the theatre, in which, in two-hours' time, the bare boughs of the chestnut-trees would gleam with a metallic lustre as the lighted gas-lamps showed up every detail of their structure; and before the ticket attendants, whose selection, advancement and ultimate fate depended upon the great artist—for she alone held power in this administration at the head of which ephemeral and purely nominal managers followed one after the other in an obscure succession—who took our tickets without even glancing at us, so preoccupied were they in seeing that all Mme Berma's instructions had been duly transmitted to the new members of the staff, that it was clearly understood that the hired applause must never sound for her, that the windows must all be kept open so long as she was not on stage and every door closed tight the moment she appeared, that a bowl of hot water must be concealed somewhere close to her to make the dust settle."
-- Within a Budding Grove by Marcel Proust, translated by C.K. Scott Moncrieff and Terence Kilmartin, Revised by D.J. Enright, p 22 of the Modern Library paperback edition

Etymology of [ephemeral]

Mon, 26 Nov 2007 14:54:11 +0000

The Greek hêmera (day-break, daybreak, daylight, days, daytime), after the goddess Hemera of 'days', is the base for this beauty of a word. The hemero root was used to mean 'day', which gives the word its metaphorical relationship to all that is temporal or passing, as the passing of a day.

Comment by bilby, 10 months ago

Fri, 23 Nov 2007 09:48:38 +0000

You'd probably want to be born with a bit of poetry in your life if you only lived for a day.

Comment by seanahan, about 1 year ago

Sat, 07 Jul 2007 14:54:24 +0000

The Mayfly is of the order ephemeroptera, which is a beautifully poetic way of describing the insect.