He’s made up his mind
November 19, 2008 12:00 pm
One of my favorite writers, Neil Gaiman, writes about the word prevaricate (it’s the first item below the Batman pictures), which he once thought meant “someone not making up their minds,” was then corrected to say it means “to lie,” and now finds that it really can mean either:
I think it’s a word with shades of meaning, and while in the US it tends to get used simply as “to lie” (as in “All politicians prevaricate”), in the UK it’s more often used as a synonym for Equivocate — i.e. to avoid giving a straight answer… even to tergiversarate. And it’s the equivocation, with its implications of putting off a decision that then shades over into meanings that aren’t simply “to lie”.
He goes on to cite the OED in support of that.
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As a Brit, I would say that ‘prevaricate’ is closer in meaning to ‘equivocate’ than ‘outright lie’.
I’m working my way through all the Sandman graphic novels at the moment, actually. Fantastic stuff (in more ways than one).
Yes, to me (another Brit) it implies twisting the truth rather than actually lying. I would definitely not use it as a synonym of ‘procrastinate,’ though. It’s etymology is interesting (Latin praevaricari, roughly to walk crookedly) and the Spanish prevaricar is related but a “false friend” to an English speaker. It means to commit the offence of not fulfilling one’s legal duties as a civil servant, particularly when someone like a judge knowingly or in wilful ignorance 0f a particular law or regulation issues an illegal sentence.
Even if I don’t agree with him, I’m a Gaiman fan, too, though I’ve only just discovered him, through Terry Pratchett.