Want To See A List Of Every Word David Foster Wallace Circled In His Dictionary?

From "Ablative absolute" ("an adverbial phrase syntactically independent from the rest of the sentence") down to "Witenagemot" ("An Anglo-Saxon advisory council to the king").

This list reminded me of two facts: first, English has a lot of words that are never used but really ought to be. Second, David Foster Wallace was very, very intelligent (but not above circling "glans penis", which, hee). A few of my favorites:

- Coxcomb ("A conceited dandy; a fop.")

- Diadem ("A crown worn as a sign of royalty.")

- Meatus ("A body opening or passage, such as the opening of the ear or the urethral canal.")

- Phlox ("Any of various North American plants of the genus Phlox, having opposite leaves and flowers with a variously colored salverform corolla.")

- Slime mold ("Any of various primitive organisms of the phylum Acrasiomycota, especially of the genus Dictyostelium, that grow on dung and decaying vegetation and have a life cycle characterized by a slimelike amoeboid stage and a multicellular reproductive stage.")

The whole list - with definitions - over at Slate.