extemporaneous

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
Jump to navigation Jump to search

English

[edit]
English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia

Etymology

[edit]

From Late Latin extemporāneus, from Latin ex tempore (impromptu).

Pronunciation

[edit]

Adjective

[edit]

extemporaneous (comparative more extemporaneous, superlative most extemporaneous)

  1. With inadequate preparation or without advance thought; offhand.
    Synonyms: off-the-cuff, (archaic) extemporal, improvised; see also Thesaurus:impromptu
    • 1855, Frederick Douglass, My Bondage and My Freedom. [], New York, Auburn, N.Y.: Miller, Orton & Mulligan [], →OCLC:
      My speeches in Great Britain were wholly extemporaneous, and I may not always have been so guarded in my expressions, as I otherwise should have been. I was ten years younger then than now, and only seven years from slavery.
    • 1920 April, F[rancis] Scott Fitzgerald, “Young Irony”, in This Side of Paradise, New York, N.Y.: Charles Scribner’s Sons, →OCLC, book II (The Education of a Personage), page 241:
      “Who the devil is there in Ramilly County,” muttered Amory aloud, “who would deliver Verlaine in an extemporaneous tune to a soaking haystack?”
    • 2017 March 1, The Lead with Jake Tapper[1], spoken by Jake Tapper, via CNN:
      The lovely words of a prepared speech, however, cannot erase extemporaneous words and deeds, thousands of them, that have run contrary to those aspirations.

Derived terms

[edit]
[edit]

Translations

[edit]