Word of the week brings you up close and personal with the noble tongue of English. This tongue will be wiggled in places where only the brave dare venture. gorey :: gor⋅ey :: ('gɔǝrɪ) A. adj. 1. a. Of books: the state in which every sentence, except the first and the last, are unnecessary to the story.

For ex.: Great Expectations by Charles Dickens: My father’s name Pirrip, and my Christian name being Philip, my infant tongue could make of both names nothing longer or more explicit than Pip. […] I was very glad afterwards to have had the interview, for in her face and in her voice, and in her touch, she gave me the assurance that suffering had been stronger than Miss Havisham’s teaching, and had given her heart to understand what my heart used to be.

And The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas: On the 24th of February 1815, the lookout at Notre-Dame de la Garde signaled the three-master, the Pharaon from Smyrna, Trieste and Naples. […] “Darling,” replied Valentine, “has not the count just told us that all human wisdom is summed up in two words? – ‘Wait and hope.’”

And The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald: In my younger and more vulnerable years, my father gave me some advice that I’ve been turning over in my mind ever since. […] So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.

Literary scholars have estimated that 99.9% of books are gorey books. Also, scholars are divided into two schools of thought on the word's origins. One school believes that the word was first attributed as praise to Edward Gorey and then as an insult to other writers and artists. The other school, however, believes that the word first came into usage during the reign of King Gorey IV, a voracious board game player, who would only read the first and the last sentences of the instruction booklet before playing.

b. as n.: The uncomfortable idea gained after reading such a book that something else is going on and it will never be made clear.

2. a. Of thoughts, feelings, etc.: sexual or violent and induced indirectly or by non-sequiturs.

b. as n.: A picture or drawing that induces sexual or violent thoughts by way of indirect suggestion.

B. n.

3. Any member of the hippopotamus family, native to the Chicago region of the U.S., that has been known to sometimes yell, “Fly at once! All is discovered.”

[tags]word, of, the, week, gorey[/tags]