1. Welter
• a) Move in a turbulent fashion. toss, roll, or rise and fall in an uncontrolled way
Usage: The shipwrecked survivors weltered in the sea for hours.
• b) A large number of items in no order. A confused mass.
Usage: He manages the welter of voices, keeping one separate from the other, and beautifully captures the irony that underpins much of the story.
2. Mandarin
• a) A high public official of imperial China. The Mandarin was a bureaucratic class that was originally created to employ individuals worthy of working in government positions. Individuals could become Mandarins through Confucian exams that were designed to select individuals that were worthy of holding government positions. Once selected, they helped create laws and acted as a civil servant to the government.
• b) Any high government official or bureaucrat
Usage: As private business consultants and magic circle lawyers flourished, BBC top brass and Whitehall mandarins saw their public servant status diminished.
• c) A member of an elite intellectual or cultural group.
Usage: Perhaps it’s time for the mandarins to listen to the disreputable miscreants.
• d) A somewhat flat reddish-orange loose skinned citrus of China.
Usage: Normally, I reach for a lemon, but this week, with the first of the clementines, mandarins and tangerines around, I’ve gone for those instead.
• e) The common spoken language of administration of the Chinese empire during the Ming and Qing dynasties.
3. Beset
• Of a problem or difficulty trouble someone or something persistently.
Usage: The story centres on a modern royal family beset by scandal.
4. Angst
• Angst is anxiety that is mixed with frustration and negativity.
Usage: One friend suggested that my climate angst was an extension of my melancholic leanings, which struck me as plausible, but not quite right.
5. Scourge
• a) Whip someone as a punishment. A scourge is a whip — or anything else that is punishing and dreadful.
Usage: Our people did scourge him severely.
• b) Cause great suffering to and extensive destruction, or ruin utterly.
Usage: Part of her brilliance as a filmmaker lies in her mastery of the cinematic canons she subjects to thorough critical scourging.
6. Vindication
• a) The action of clearing someone of blame or suspicion.
Usage: I intend to work to ensure my full vindication.
• b) Proof that someone or something is right, reasonable, or justified.
Usage: The results were interpreted as vindication of the company’s policy.
7. Nocuous
• Noxious, harmful, or poisonous.
Usage: The old man succumbed to the bite of the nocuous insect.
8. Succour
• Assistance and support in times of hardship and distress.
Usage: The wounded had little chance of succour.
9. Acolyte
• a) A person assisting a priest in a religious service or procession.
• b) An assistant or follower.
Usage: She runs the department through a small group of acolytes.
10. Eerie
• Strange and frightening, or suggestively supernatural
Usage: Empty buses glowed from within with eerie gray light, chugging slowly from one stop to the next, their drivers sleepy and bored.
