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The ordinary-sized words are for everyone, but the big ones are especially for children.



Friday 27 January 2012

Word To Use Today: frisson.

Frisson...that shiver you get when something startlingly marvellous happens.

It might involve diamonds (yes, there are plenty of very shallow people about) or a sleeping child (I'm afraid the sleeping thing does help, doesn't it?) or sunlight on water.

A cathedral, a Vermeer, a steam train, a goal, a wedding dress.

A whale, a flower, an eagle, a butterfly.

A song.

I hope you feel a frisson today.

Here's something that might help:



Word To Use Today: frisson. This word is French, and means shiver. It arrived in English in the 1700s, but has only been common for the last hundred years or so. It's related to the Latin fricare, which means to rub or chafe, and to another Latin word frigere, which means, amongst other things, to be cold, or, oddly, to roast.

1 comment:

  1. Frisson is one of my favourite words and I use it all the time. Unlike FECULA and RADULA who could be sisters, no?

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