summary
abridgment
abstract
digest
outline
strait-laced, this word has fewer legitimate uses in today’s more tolerant atmosphere, since many kinds of direct references to sex, much less glancing allusions of any sort, are not thought particularly bold: It was once thought risque for a woman to dine alone with a man in his apartment; gentlemen who traded risque jokes once the ladies had retired after dinner. Off-color has been similarly affected, although its vagueness still permits its application, particularly to jokes of any sort that hinge on sexual matters: an off-color joke that was currently making the rounds of the girls dormitory. But dirty joke” is a more common description of this kind of humor.
The remaining words are not restricted to sexuality alone. Of these, earthy is the broadest in application. If once it was disapproving for something coarse or crude in reference to sexual and bodily functions, now it may be descriptively neutral or even approving: the earthy humor of Chaucer and Shakespeare. The word may even suggest a sentimental nostalgia for the supposedly simpler and more direct life that man lived previous to modern complexities: the trend to urbanization that has robbed man of his earthy acceptance of the natural processes of birth, copulation, death, and decay. Racy can apply to accounts that, are erotic, pornographic, or earthy, but in this case the word suggests fastpaced action and a linguistic forcefulness gained through frank and direct expressions: a racy book about marital infidelity in a suburban housing development. When racy applies to actions it can indicate earthy behavior that is marked by high-spirited energy and linguistic gusto: a customer whose racy, pungent speech and erotic prowess would have put Don Juan to shame.
Raunchy is an informal word with a variety of applications. It can refer to personal uncleanliness or to an earthy disregard of hygienic niceties: He felt raunchy all over after three solid days of hiking in the forest; a beer-guzzling, raunchy brute of a husband. It can also refer to an intense but unappeased building up of sexual appetite: raunchy soldiers on leave in Tokyo.
Both Rabelaisian and scatological emphasize earthy expression or behavior. Rabelaisian, like racy, indicates high-spirited zest, but stresses a penchant for good-humored tomfoolery involving a preoccupation with sexual and excretory functions. The word refers to the French writer, Rabelais, whose work reflected such concerns: the Rabelaisian wit of many contemporary Southern novelists; a Rabelaisian rascal who delighted in playing obscene practical jokes on his friends. Scatological is a word of neutral description for a fascination with excrement or with the excretory functions. It is useful in discriminating work with this emphasis from other possibly obscene material that is focused on sexual functions: the scatological emphasis in the works of Jonathan Swift; soldiers whose language is larded with obscene and scatological references. See EROTIC, INDECENT, LEWD, SMUTTY.
Antonyms: bland, decorous, genteel, innocent, prissy.
These words refer to a short description of the main points of a longer work or presentation. Summary is the most general of these words, referring to any attempt to condense into as few words as possible an extended train of thought: a day-to-day summary of the proceedings in the murder trial; concluding each chapter with a summary of its main arguments. The word implies a pithy paraphrase, with no attempt to catch the style of the original. Also, the word almost exclusively refers to something that follows after and is based on the extended presenta
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tion, or even concludes it — as suggested by the common phrase in speechmaking: in summary. Abstract and precis both refer to summaries written most often by someone other than the original author; hence they are seldom part of the original presentation, though they follow it and are based upon it. Like summary, they stress brevity and the schematic representation of essential points with no attempt to preserve flavor. Abstract most specifically refers to a scholarly or legal citation that gives the gist of what may be a complex argument or study: a quarterly containing abstracts of doctoral dissertations in progress; an abstract of the proposed legislation. Precis may suggest a lengthier treatment than abstract and one in which the exact ordering of points in the original is adhered to; also, it is not restricted to legal or scholarly fields, applying to any summary of thought or argument in an essay or other nonfiction prose: each sentence in the precis representing a paragraph in the essay; space quota that permitted abstracts but ruled out precis of research projects. The word can even refer to a skeletal list-like presentation of whole fields of knowledge: a precis of Renaissance art history.
Outline and synopsis relate to precis in that they both retain the point-by-point ordering of the original; they are both most often a skeletal setting down of these points, but may be drawn up either by the author or someone else before, as well as after, the writing of the original. Within these possibilities, outline covers a wider range than synopsis. It often suggests a numbered and lettered list which may contain nothing more than key words or phrases, but which may, on the other hand, present an extended prose paraphrase: a summary of French history written in the form of an outline ; drawing up an outline of the author’s arguments. Synopsis usually refers to a plot summary of a piece of fiction. Ordinary prose sentences are most often used, rather than the numbered and lettered list suggested by outline. It may tell in capsule form events treated in a completed work or those planned for a projected work: submitting the first chapter of his novel and a synopsis of the unwritten remainder; writing synopses of novels submitted as candidates for film treatment. The word may also refer to a paragraph that retells previous action and introduces an installment of a serialized work of fiction.
Abridgment and digest refer to more expanded treatment, suggesting condensation rather than a capsule paraphrase of the original. Consequently, what is presented after this shortening process may still be substantially in the original author’s own words and style. Of the two, abridgment suggests the least modification of the original; it may refer, in fact, merely to the excision of a relatively few passages: an abridgment in which passages involving sexual frankness were omitted. The word can, however, indicate a greater amount of change: several characters and the whole subplot that did not appear in the abridgment, a useful one-volume abridgment of Gibbon. Digest refers to a boiled-down recasting of the original to present its essentials in shorter space. Although the original author’s style and flavor may be retained at times, other passages may be rewritten on grounds of clarity or brevity: a concise digest of the judge’s long dissent. The word may also refer to a collection of condensed pieces: a quarterly digest of articles pertaining to space research. In some scholarly or technical uses, the word may suggest nearly the sort of brevity implicit in abstract: a digest of all the articles presented at the annual medical convention. See shorten, terse.
summary
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precis
synopsis
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