prevaricate/procrastinate

[Prof. R. Sussex]

Arnold Zwicky is right about the gradual promotion of the "put off"
meaning of "prevaricate".  There is a story about an incident
involving an interpreter during a visit of (I believe) Giscard
d'Estaing to Margaret Thatcher. As I remember it (perhaps
erratically), Thatcher used "prevaricate" in the "put off" sense, and
the translator rendered it in French as prévariquer, which means
something like "depart from justice, betray one's trust". Giscard is
reported to have been Gallically glacial.

Anyhow, it's a nice story.

Roly Sussex

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Roly Sussex
Professor of Applied Language Studies
Department of French, German, Russian, Spanish and Applied Linguistics
School of Languages and Comparative Cultural Studies
The University of Queensland
Brisbane
Queensland 4072
AUSTRALIA

Office: Forgan-Smith Tower 403
Phone:  +61 7 3365 6896
Fax:    +61 7 3365 2798
Email:  sussex at uq.edu.au
Web:    http://www.arts.uq.edu.au/slccs/profiles/sussex.html
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