Orotund

Quick meaning: Orotund is an adjective meaning Of writing, etc.: clear, effective, powerful.

Meaning

Of writing, etc.: clear, effective, powerful.

More Meanings

1. Of speech or writing: bombastic, pompous.
2. (countable) A voice characterized by clarity, fullness, smoothness, and strength of sound.
3. (uncountable) The quality of clarity, effectiveness, and power in speech or writing.
4. Of a voice: characterized by clarity, fullness, smoothness, and strength of sound; hence, of a person: having a clear, full, and strong voice, appropriate for public speaking, reading aloud, etc.

Example Sentences

He would also, you can't help thinking, have approved [Alan] Hollinghurst's discriminating eye and perhaps even enjoyed the half-facetious, half-adoring tributes Nick pays to his famously orotund late style, the "plums of periphrasis" Nick likes to slip into his conversation.

A series of U.N. and government officials spoke. And spoke. And spoke. Their words were grand, their sentences endless. In orotund turns of phrase—indeed, in spiraling helices of phrase; in snarled fishing lines of phrase; in endless small intestines of phrase—the speakers ingeniously explored and invented connections between qwerty, alphabetical filing, and socioeconomic advance.

When Groucho Marx was once asked a long and orotund question, he replied, "Whom knows?" […] The popularity of "whom" humour tells us two things about the distinction between "who" and "whom". First, "whom" has long been perceived as formal verging on pompous. Second, the rules for its proper use are obscure to many speakers, tempting them to drop "whom" into their speech whenever they want to sound posh.

Word Forms

• orotunds

Synonyms for orotund

Depending on context, synonyms include resonant, rotund, booming, boom-boom, remugient, resounding.

Related Words

Related dictionary entries include rhetorical, declamatory, bombastic, large, rotund, full.

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