Shambling Towards Hiroshima Vocabulary

Words from Shambling Towards Hiroshima by James Morrow that I didn't know. Some of which I really should have.



Neurasthenic: pertaining to or suffering from neurasthenia

Neurasthenia: a psychological disorder characterized by chronic fatigue and weakness, loss of memory, and generalized aches and pains, formerly thought to result from exhaustion of the nervous system. No longer in scientific use

Tallith: a shawl-like garment of wool, silk, or the like, with fringes, or zizith, at the four corners, worn around the shoulders by Orthodox and Conservative (sometimes also Reform) Jews, as during the morning service.

Ineluctable: incapable of being evaded; inescapable

Fantods: a state of extreme nervousness or restlessness; the willies; the fidgets

Klieg: kind of arc lamp used as a studio light, 1925, from U.S. engineers, brothers Anton and John Kliegl, who invented it

Seraphic: of, like, or befitting a seraph (okay I really should have been able to figure that one out)

Tumesce: to make or become tumescent

Tumescent: swelling; slightly tumid
2. exhibiting or affected with many ideas or emotions; teeming
3. pompous and pretentious, esp. in the use of language; bombastic

Tremolos: a tremulous or vibrating effect produced on certain instruments and in the human voice, as to express emotion

Obstreperous: resisting control or restraint in a difficult manner; unruly

Isinglass: a pure, transparent or translucent form of gelatin, obtained from the air bladders of certain fish, esp. the sturgeon: used in glue and jellies and as a clarifying agent
2. mica, esp. in thin, translucent sheets

Barbel: a slender, external process on the jaw or other part of the head of certain fishes

Threnody: a poem, speech, or song of lamentation, esp. for the dead; dirge; funeral song