Monday, September 17, 2012

Fascicle

Meaning: a little bundle; in literary terms an instalment or a section of a greater work. Probably best known as a description of the hand-made booklets of poems left by Emily Dickinson.

Usefulness: 1 ("Of course, my email is but a fascicle." "She's really dropped her fascicle on this one.")

Logofascination: 2

In the wild: perhaps unsurprisingly, heard during a lecture on Emily Dickinson

Degrees: 2

Connections: fascicle - fascine (via Latin fascis, bundle, also a root for Fascism)

Which is used in: G&P, Third Book, LII: How a certain kind of Pantagruelion is of that nature that the fire is not able to consume it.
"When Caesar had understood that the chief defence of those within the castle did consist in stones and clubs, and that it was not an easy matter to sling, hurl, dart, throw, or cast them so far as to hinder the approaches, he forthwith commanded his men to throw great store of bavins, faggots, and fascines round about the castle, and when they had made the heap of a competent height, to put them all in a fair fire; which was thereupon incontinently done."

1 comment:

  1. Very useful if you discover some cryogenically-preserved Nazis.

    ReplyDelete