bowdlerize

****************************************************************
Happy Birthday Noah Webster! At a youthful 248, you're 
still the Web Master! Read all about him here:
http://www.merriam-webster.com/info/noah.htm
****************************************************************

The Word of the Day for October 15 is: 

bowdlerize \BOUD-ler-ize\   verb
     1 : to expurgate by omitting or modifying parts considered vulgar 
   *2 : to modify by abridging, simplifying, or distorting in style or content 

Example sentence:
     The new regime bowdlerized history books, deleting all mention of the 
leaders of the resistance.

Did you know?
     Few editors have achieved the notoriety of Thomas Bowdler. Bowdler was 
trained as a physician, but when illness prevented him from practicing 
medicine, he turned to warning Europeans about unsanitary conditions at French 
watering places. He then carried his quest for purification to literature, and 
in 1818 he published his _Family Shakspeare_ [sic], a work in which he promised 
that "those words and expressions are omitted which cannot with propriety be 
read aloud in a family." The sanitized volume was popular with the public of 
the day, but literary critics denounced his modifications of the words of the 
Bard. Bowdler applied his literary eraser broadly, and within 11 years of his 
death in 1825, the word "bowdlerize" was being used to refer to expurgating 
books or other texts.

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence. 





You Are Subscribed As: gclw-mw-wod7@xxxxxxxxx
To unsubscribe, change your e-mail address or to subscribe to the html
version of Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day, featuring audio
pronunciations, please visit:

http://www.startsampling.com/sm/wod/changeofaddress.iphtml

(c) 2006 by Merriam-Webster, Incorporated

Merriam-Webster, Inc.
47 Federal Street
P.O. Box 281
Springfield, MA 01102