An Exaltation of Larks – a book with line drawings illustrating collective nouns

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Merriam-Webster dictionary say that a collective noun is:

 

“a noun such as ‘team’ or ‘flock’ that refers to a group of people or things”

 

On January 9, 2023 I blogged about Taking pride in collective nouns. In that post I mentioned a couple illustrated books about them. From the main Boise public library, I borrowed the second, 138-page, 1977 edition of an older book by James Lipton titled An Exaltation of Larks or the venereal game. This edition adds over a hundred new entries beyond the 1968 edition, some illustrated by hilarious black-and-white line drawings. Some examples are these twenty for professions:

 

Bacteriologists     colony

Brokers                 portfolio

Cab Drivers          drove

Chemists              colloid

Economists          recession

Foresters              stalk

Gardeners            sprinkling

Golfers                  lie

Gymnasts             tumbler

Harpists                melody

Journalists            slant

Judges                   sentence

Mechanics            torque

Photographers    click

Physicists             nucleus

Playwrights          plot

Public Speakers   twaddle

Repairmen           overcharge

Undertakers        unction

Urologists             void

 

The image of four judges came from Wikimedia Commons.