The Catcher In The Rye Vocab

Front 1

acute

Back 1

keen or quick of mind; shrewd; sensitive to impressions

Front 2

ambivalent

Back 2

having conflicting feelings about something or someone at the same time

Front 3

artless

Back 3

natural, simple, without artificiality or pretension

Front 4

astute

Back 4

having a clever or shrewd mind; perceiving things clearly

Front 5

candor, candid

Back 5

honesty and frankness in expressing oneself; direct and straightforward

Front 6

cynic, cynical

Back 6

believing that people are only motivated by selfishness; denying the sincerity of people's motives; a failure to believe the best in people (opposite of "faith")

Front 7

deplore

Back 7

to be regretful or sorry about something; to regard something as unfortunate

Front 8

depravity

Back 8

corruption, wickedness, perversion

Front 9

deride, derision

Back 9

to make fun of something; to ridicule; to laugh at in a scornful or mocking way

Front 10

despondent

Back 10

feeling a loss of courage or hope; dejected

Front 11

digression

Back 11

to depart temporarily from the main subject

Front 12

discerning

Back 12

having good judgement or understanding; perceiving or recognizing the truth clearly

Front 13

dejection

Back 13

lowness of spirits or depression

Front 14

disillusionment

Back 14

the condition of losing your ideals, illusions, or foolish hopes; to acquire bitter knowledge through the loss of innocent ideals

Front 15

dissimulation

Back 15

to hide one's true feelings by avoiding the truth (less than outright lying by usually amounts to the same thing)

Front 16

dogmatic

Back 16

stating your opinion in an agressive way, with no real evidence of its truth; always insisting that you are right; always "instructing" others, even when that is inappropriate

Front 17

duplicity

Back 17

hypocritical cunning or deception; doube-dealing

Front 18

glib

Back 18

speaking in a smooth, easy manner in order to be convincing, often for a selfish purpose

Front 19

hypocrisy

Back 19

pretending to be what one is not, esp. pretending to be good for a devious or selfish reason; pretending to feel what one does not actually feel, esp. sympathy or pity

Front 20

humane

Back 20

having what everyone considers the best qualities of mankind, like kindness, mercy, and sympathy; civilized in a kind, generous way

Front 21

idealism

Back 21

behavior or thought based on a conception of things as they should be or as one would with them to be (opposite of "cynicism")

Front 22

incorrigible

Back 22

that which cannot be corrected, improved, or reformed

Front 23

ingenuous

Back 23

honest, open, direct, simple, child-like, frank (very close to "candid" and "artless")

Front 24

integrity

Back 24

the quality of moral "wholeness"; the state of being of sound moral principle; uprightness, honesty, sincerity

Front 25

irony, ironic

Back 25

the quality of being different or the opposite of what one would expect (irony is often humorous, in a sad sort of way, as in the number of thieves in the dorms of expensive boarding schools that Holden has attended)

Front 26

mendacity

Back 26

quality of being false or lying

Front 27

pedagogical

Back 27

having to do with art and science of teaching

Front 28

perversion

Back 28

moral corruption and deviant behavior, esp. sexual deviancy (close to "depravity")

Front 29

platitude

Back 29

a trite, commonplace saying, delivered as if it's fresh or original

Front 30

poignancy

Back 30

emotionally touching or moving; sharply painful to the feelings

Front 31

perfidy

Back 31

the deliberate breaking of faith; treachery, betrayal of trust

Front 32

precocious

Back 32

intelligent or perceptive beyond what is expected at a certain age

Front 33

pretense, pretentious

Back 33

a claim to distinction, importance, dignity, or excellence that is unsupported or false; affectedly grand or superior

Front 34

profane

Back 34

violating something that is sacred; showing disrespect or contempt for sacred things

Front 35

recluse

Back 35

one who avoids human contact or company; one who shuts himself away from the world and seeks seclusion; a solitary person

Front 36

remorse

Back 36

a deep, torturing sense of guilt over a wrong

Front 37

reprehensible

Back 37

blameworthy; something deserving of great reprimand or rebuke

Front 38

reverent

Back 38

feeling of deep respect, love, and awe for something sacred; veneration (opposite of "profane")

Front 39

satirize

Back 39

to make fun of something in order to expose its weaknesses and foolishness; to ridicule for a moral purpose

Front 40

skeptic

Back 40

one who doubts, quesitons, or suspends judgement upon matters that are generally accepted by the majority (the may be a "healthy skepticism" or it may be excessively negative)

Front 41

spurious

Back 41

false, counterfeit; not true or genuine

Front 42

vulgarity

Back 42

crude, coarse, unrefined; indecent, obscene

Front 43

whimsy, whimsical

Back 43

fanciful, oddly or charmingly imaginative

Front 44

escapist

Back 44

a tendency to want to free oneself from reality, responsibilities, or the routine of real life

Front 45

sympathy

Back 45

to feel sorry for someone

Front 46

empathy

Back 46

you actually imagine yourself in their shoes