Barron's 1100 Words You Need to Know » Week 8 - Day 4

Word List
  • excruciating [ek skrü´ shē ā ting]
    agonizing, torturing
    → “An almost excruciating agitation results when a leaf falls into still water.” Jack London, “To Build a Fire”
  • respite [res´ pit]
    an interval of relief, delay
    → “The plan enabled the oiler and the correspondent to set respite together.” Stephen Crane, “The Open Boat”
  • reverberating [ri vėr´ bə rāt´ ing]
    reechoing, resounding
    → “When that putt plunked into the hole yesterday, the 40,000 people exploded in a roar that reverberated through more than a century of U.S. Open history.” Dave Anderson, “Longest Final Putt,” New York Times, 6/21/99
  • fretful [fret´ fəl]
    worrisome, irritable
    → “When Mike Nichols directed ‘Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?’ Warner Bros. was fretful, worrying about the Legion of Decency.” Liz Smith, “Century’s Choice,” New York Post, 6/23/99
  • succumb [sə kum´]
    to give way, yield
    → “This young gentleman was of an excellent family but had been reduced to such poverty that the energy of his character succumbed beneath it.” Edgar Allan Poe, “The Murders in the Rue Morgue”

From August, 1959 until his death in January, 1961, Dooley suffered almost continuous, excruciating pain. His normal weight of 180 was cut in half, and even the pain-killing drugs could no longer bring relief. Knowing that he did not have long to live, Dr. Dooley worked without respite on behalf of MEDICO, the organization he had founded to bring medical aid and hope to the world’s sick and needy. The lines of Robert Frost kept reverberating in his mind during those fretful days: “The woods are lovely, dark and deep/ But I have promises to keep/ And miles to go before I sleep.” When he finally succumbed, millions throughout the world were stunned and grief-stricken by the tragedy.

Sample Sentences Use the new words in the following sentences.

  1. With __________ slowness, the minute hand inched its way around the clock.
  2. The rescue team heard the miner’s voice __________ through the caves.
  3. Around income tax time __________ faces are ubiquitous.*
  4. The voluble* insurance salesman gave my father no __________.
  5. Besieged* by debts, the corporation finally had to __________ to bankruptcy.

Definitions Match the new words with their meanings.

  1. a. an interval of relief, delay
  2. b. worrisome, irritable
  3. c. reechoing, resounding
  4. d. agonizing, torturing
  5. e. to give way, yield
  1. excruciating __________
  2. respite __________
  3. reverberating __________
  4. fretful __________
  5. succumb __________

Answer Key
a red herring—something that diverts attention from the main issue (a red herring drawn across a fox’s path destroys the scent)
We felt that the introduction of his war record was a red herring to keep us from inquiring into his graft.

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