Gre 333

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abate (v)

Back 1

"subside or moderate. Rather than leaving immediately, they waited for the storm to abate"

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aberrant (a)

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"abnormal or deviant. Given the aberrant nature of the data, we came to doubt the validity of the entire experiment"

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abeyance (n)

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suspend action. The deal was held in abeyance until her arrival.

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abscond (v)

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depart secretely and hide. The teller who absconded with the bonds went uncaptured until someone recognized him from his photograph on America's Most Wanted

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abstemious (a)

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"sparing in eating and drinking: temperate. Concerned whether her vegetarian son's abstemious diet provided him with sufficient protein, the worried mother pressed food on him."

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admonish (v)

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"warn; reprove. When her courtiers questioned her religious beliefs, Mary Stuart admonished them, declaring that she would worship as she spleased."

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adulterate (v) adulteration (n)

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"make impure by adding inferior or tainted substances. It is a crime to adulterate foods without informing the buyer; when consumers learned that Beechnut had adulterated its apple juice by mixing the juice with water, they protested vigorously. "

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aesthetic (a) aesthete (n)

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artistic; dealing with or capable of appreciating the beautiful. The beauty of Tiffany's stained glass appealed to Alice's aesthetic sense

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"aggregate (v , adj) aggregation (n)"

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"gather; accumulate. Before the Wall Street scandals, delers in so-called junk bonds managed to aggregate great welath in short periods of time."

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alacrity (n)

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cheerful promptness; eagerness. Phil and Dave were raring to get off to the mountains; they packed up their ski gear and climbed into the van with alacrity.

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alleviate (v)

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"relieve. This should alleviate the pain; if it does not, we shall have to use stronger drugs."

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amalgamate (v)

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combine; unite in one body. The unions will attempt to amalgamate their groups into the one national body.

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"ambiguous (a), ambiguity (n)"

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unclear or doubtful in meaning. His ambiguous instructions misled us; we did not know which road to take.

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ambivalence (n) ambivalent (a)

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"the state of having contradictory or conflicting emotional attitudes. Torn between loving her parents one minute and hating them the next, she was confused by the ambinvalence of her feelings"

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ameliorate (v)

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improve. Many social workers have attempted to ameliorate the conditions of people living in the slums.

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"anachronism (n), anachronistic (a)"

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something or someone misplaced in time. Shakespeare's reference to clocks in Julius Caesar is an anachronism; no clocks existed in Caesar's time.

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analogous (a)

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comparable. She called our attention to the things that had been done in an analogous situation and recommended that we do the same.

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anarchy (n)

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absence of governing body; state of disorder. The assasination of the leaders led to a period of anarchy.

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anomalous (a)

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abnormal; irregular. She was placed in the anomalous position of seeming to approve procedures that she despised.

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antipathy (n)

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"aversion; dislike. Tom's extreme antipathy for disputes keeps him from getting into arguments with his termperamental wife. Noise in any form is antipathetic to him. Among his other antipathies are honking cars, boom boxes, and heavy metal rock."

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apathy (n) apathetic (a)

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"lack of caring; indifference. A firm believer in democratic government, she could not understand the apathy of people who never bothered to vote. "

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appease (v) appeasement (n)

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"pacify or soothe; relieve. Tom and Jody tried to appease the crying baby by offering him one toy after another. However, he would not calm down until they appeased his hunger by giving him a bottle. "

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apprise (v)

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"inform. When NASA was apprised of the dangerous weather conditions, the head of the space agency decided to postpone the shuttle launch"

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approbation (n)

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"approval. Wanting her parent's regard, she looked for some sign of approbation. Bejnamin Franklin, that shrewd observer of mankind, once wrote, ""We must not in the course of public life expect immediate approbation and immediate grateful acknowledgement of our services."""

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appropriate (v)

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acquire; take possession of for one's own use. The rance owners appropriated the lands that had originally been set aside for the Indians' use

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arduous (a)

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hard; strenuous. Her arduous efforts had sapped her energy.

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artless (a)

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"without guile; open and honest. Red Riding Hood's artless comment. ""Grandma, what big eyes you have!"" indicates the child's innocent surprise at her ""grandmother's changed appearance."

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"ascetic (a, n) asceticism (n)"

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"practicing self-denial; austere. The wealthy, self-indulgent young man felt oddly drawn to the strict, ascetic life led by members of some monastic orders."

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assiduous (a)

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diligent. It took Rembrandt weeks or assiduous labor before he was satisfied with his portrait of his son.

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assuage (v) assuagement (n)

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"ease or lessen (pain); satisfy (hunger); soothe (anger). Jilted by Jane, Dick tried to assuage his heartache by indulging in ice cream. One gallon later, he had assuaged his appetite but not his grief."

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attenuate (v)

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"make thinner; weaken or lessen (in density, force, degree). The long, dr pell attenuated the creek to the merest trickle. When a meteor strikes the ground, the initially intense shock attenuates or lessens as it diverges outward."

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audacious (a) audacity (n)

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daring; bold. Audiences cheered as Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia made their audacious death-defying leap to freedom and escaped Darth Vader's troops.

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austere (a)

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"forbiddingly sterm; severely simple and unornamented. The headmaster's austere demeanor tended to scare off the more timid students, who never visisted his study willingly. The room reflected the man, austere and bare, like a monk's cell, with no touches of luxury to moderate its austerity."

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autonomous (a) autonomy (n)

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"self-governing. Althought the Univrsity of California Berkeley is just one part of the state university system, in many ways Cal Berekley is autonomous, for it runs several programs that are not subject to outside control"

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aver (v)

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"assert confidently or declare; as used in lawy, state formally as a fact. The self-proclaimed psychic averred that, because he had extrasensory perception on which to base his predictions, he needed no seismographs or other gadgets in order to foretell earthquakes."

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banal (a)

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hackneyed; commonpace; trite; lacking originaity. The hack writer's worn-out cliches made his comic sketch seem banal. He even resorted to the banality of having someone slip on a banana peel!

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belie (v)

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"contradict; give a false impression. His coarse, hard-bitten exterior belied his innate sensitivity"

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beneficient (a)

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kindly; doing good. The overgenerous philanthropist had to curb his beneficient impulses before he gave away all his money and left himself with nothing

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bolster (v)

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support; reinforce. The debaters amassed file boxes full of evidence to bolster their arguments.

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bombastic (a) bombast (n)

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"pompous; using inflated language. Puffed up with conceit, the orato spoke in such a bombastic manner that we longed to deflate him."

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boorish (a)

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"rude; insensitive. Though Mr. Potts constantly interrupted his wife, she ignored his boorish behavior, for she had lost hope of teaching him courtesy."

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burgeon (v)

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"grow forth; send out buds. In the spring, the plants that burgeon are a promise of the beauty that is to come."

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burnish (v)

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make shiny by rubbing; polish. The maid burnished the brass fixtures until they reflected the lamplight.

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"buttress (v, n)"

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support; prop up. Just as architects buttress the walls of cathedrals with flying buttresses; debaters buttress their arguments with facts.

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cacophonous (a) cacophony (n)

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discordant; inharmonious. Do the students in the orchestra enjoy the cacophonous sounds they make when their tuning up? I don't know how they can stand the racket.

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capricious (a)

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"unpredictable; fickle. The storm was capricious; it changd course constantly. Jill was capricious, too: she changed boyfriends almost as often as she changed clothes"

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castigation (n)

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"punishement; severe criticism. Snsitive even to mild criticism, Woolf could not bear the castigation that she found in certain reviews. Ben Jonson was a highly moral playwright: in his plays, his purpose was to castigate vice and hypocrisy by exposing them publicly."

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catalyst (n)

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agent that influences the pace of a chemical reaction while it remains unaffected and unchanged person or thing that cuases action.

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caustic (a)

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burning; sarcastically biting. The critic's caustic remarks angered the hapless actors who were the subjects of his sarcasm.

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chicanery (n)

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"trickery; deception. Those sneaky lawyers misrepresented what occurred, made up, all sorts of implausible alternative scenarios to confuse the jurors, and in general depended on chicanery to win the case."

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coagulate (v) coagulant (n)

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"thicken; congeal; clot. Even after you remove the pudding from the burner, it will continue to coagulate as it stands. "

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coda (n)

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"concluding section of a musical or literary composition; something that rounds out, summarizes or concludes. The piece concluded with a distinctive coda that strikingly brough together various motifs. Several months after Charlie Chaplin's death, his body was briefly kidnapped from a Swiss cemetery by a pair of bungling thieves - a macabre coda that Chaplin might have concocted for one of his own two-reelers"

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cogent (a)

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"convincing. It was inevitable that David chose to go to Harvard: he had several cogent reasons for doing so, including a full-tuition scholarship. Katya argued her case with such cogency that the jury had to decide in favor of her client."

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commensurate (a)

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"corresponding in extent, degree, amount, etc.; proportionate. By the close of World War II much progress had been made in assigning nurses rank and responsibilities commensurate with their training and abilities commensurate with their training an abilities. Critics in the indusry charged that imposing new meat inspection regulations without dismantling the traditional system would raise costs without brining about a commensurate improvement in saftey"

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compendium (v)

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"brief, comprehensive summary. This text can serve as a compendum of the tremendous amount of new material being developed in this field."

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complaisant (a)

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"trying to please; overly polite; obliging. Fearing that the king might become enraged if his will were thwarted, the complaisant Parliament recognized Henry VIII as king of Ireland. Someone complaisant is not smug or complacent; he yields to others because he has an excessive need to please."

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compliant (a)

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"yielding conforming to requirements. Because Joel usually gave in and went along with whatever his friends desired, his mother worried that he might be too compliant."

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conciliatory (a) conciliate (v)

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reconciling; soothing. She was still angry despite his conciliatory words.

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condone (v)

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"overlook; forgive; give tacit approval; excuse. Unlike Widow Douglass, who condoned Hucks's minor offenses, Miss Watons did nothing but scold."

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confound (v)

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confuse; puzzle. No mystery could confound Sherlock Homles for long

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connoisseur (n)

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"person competent to act as a judge of art, etc.; a lover of an art. Bernard Berenson, the American art critic and connoisseur of Italian art, was hired by wealthy art lovers to select paintings for theircollections"

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contention (n) contend (v)

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"claim; thesis. It is our contention that if you follow our tactics, you will boost your score on the GRE."

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contentious (a)

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"quarrelsome. Disagreeing violently with the referees' ruling, the coach became so contentious that the referees threw him out of the game"

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contrite (a) contrition (n)

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penitent. Her contrite tears did not influence the judge when he imposed sentence.

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conundrum (n)

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"riddle difficult problem. During the long car ride, she invented conundrums to entertain the children"

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converge (v) convergence (n)

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approach; tend to meet; come together. African-American men from all over the United States converged on Washington to take part in the historic Million Man March

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convoluted (a)

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coiled around; involved; intricate. His argument was so convoluted that few of us could follow it intelligently

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craven (a)

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"cowardly. Lillian's craven refusal to join the protest was criticized by her comrades, who had expected her to be brave enough to stand up for her beliefs."

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daunt (v)

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"intimidate; frighten. ""Boast all you like or your prowess. Mere words cannot daunt me."" the hero answered the villain."

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decorum (n)

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"propriety; orderliness and good taste in manners. Event the best-mannered students have trouble behaving with decorum on the last day of school, decorous (a)"

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default (n)

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"failure to act. When the visiting team failed to show up for the big game, they lost the game by default. When Jack failed to make the payments on his Jaguar, the dealership took back the car because he had defaulted on his debt."

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deference (n)

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"courteous regard for another's wish. In deference to the minister's request, please do not take photographs during the wedding service."

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delineate (v) delineation (n)

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"portray; depict; sketch. Using only a few descriptive phrases, Austen delineates the character of Mr. Collins so well that we can rpredict his every move."

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denigrate (v)

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blacken. All attempts to denigrate the character of our late president have failed; the people still love him and cherish his memory.

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deride (v) derisive (a)

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"ridicule; make fun of. The critics derided his pretentious dialogue and refused to consider his play seriously. Despite the critics' derision, however, audiences were moved by the play, cheering its unabashedly sentimental conclusion. "

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derivative (a)