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jke - Staying on TopWith all the info floating around, it’s often difficult to stay on top of it. I came up with these pages to help. This information will hopefully help you to be a bit more knowledgeable and successful.Words Commonly Confused Source: John E. McIntyre, copy desk chief, The Baltimore Sun Cement/concrete –– The powder in a bag is cement. Concrete is the substance made from cement, water, sand and gravel If you're not writing about a powder, don't use cement. Exhaustive/exhausting –– Exhaustive means thorough and complete –– in the sense that a topic is exhausted, used up. Exhausting means profoundly tiring. Flack/flak –– Flack is a pejorative word for someone engaged in public relations; flak, or anti-aircraft fire, is what a flack catches from the press. Flair/flare –– See Scrooge with a Christian flare in this new musical. A flare is a bright light. Flair, which originally referred to a dog's ability to discriminate among smells, has come to mean a talent, aptitude or knack. Forward/foreword –– Forward is a direction; a foreword is an introduction to a book, the words that come before the main text. Hark/hearken –– To harkis to listen; to hearken is to heed. To recall an earlier time is to hark back, not hearken back. Lead/led –– Lead (pronounced 'led') is a metal. Lead (pronounced 'leed') is the verb meaning to direct or guide. Led (also pronounced "led") is the past tense of the verb. It is presumably the confusion of sounds that leads some writers to use lead as the past tense of the verb; do not be led astray. Loath/loathe –– Loath is reluctant (and mildly archaic); loathe means to despise. Mantel/mantle –– A mantel is a shelf above a fireplace. A mantle is a cloak, often used metaphorically to indicate the authority or responsibility of an office –– the mantle of power. Peak/pique –– A peak is a mountaintop (noun) or the arrival at a high point (verb). Pique is resentment (as a noun) or arousal or provocation (as a verb). Interest rates can peak, but one's interest is piqued. Restful/restive –– Restive means unruly or balky, jumpy or nervous. Restful means soothing. Role/roll –– Membership roles at fat farms, health spas and racket clubs would swell. A role is the part of a character in a play; a roll is a list or register (Whether it is prudent to use the verb "swell" in the context of "fat farms" is a separate question.) Trooper/trouper –– A trooper is a soldier, a trouper is an experienced actor. When we speak of someone who comes through difficult circumstances dependably, we call that person a trouper. |
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