exclaim
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: ipa: /ɛkˈskleɪm/
ipa: /ɪkˈskleɪm/
rhymes: -eɪm
Forms: form: exclaims
form: exclaiming
form: exclaimed
form: exclaimed
form: exclame
Etymology: From Middle French exclamer, from Latin exclāmō, exclāmāre (“call out”), from ex- + clāmō (“to call”).
Senses: examples: text: I am a soldier, and unapt to weep,
Or to exclaim on fortune’s fickleness.
ref: 1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Sixt”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene iii]:
text: Very grave and good Women exclaimed against Men who begot Children and then disowned them.
ref: 1749, Henry Fielding, chapter 9, in The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, volume (please specify |volume=I to VI), London: A[ndrew] Millar, […], →OCLC, book I, page 33:
text: This wretched note was the finale of Emma’s breakfast. When once it had been read, there was no doing any thing, but lament and exclaim.
ref: 1815 December (indicated as 1816), [Jane Austen], Emma: […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: […] [Charles Roworth and James Moyes] for John Murray, →OCLC:
text: […] he could remember Sally tearing off a rose, stopping to exclaim at the beauty of the cabbage leaves in the moonlight […]
ref: 1925, Virginia Woolf, Mrs Dalloway, New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, published 1985, page 114:
text: […] at the front door below a few guests were leaving, and the bright rectangle widened and narrowed as they slipped out into the night, laughing and exclaiming about the weather.
ref: 2011, Alan Hollinghurst, The Stranger’s Child, New York: Knopf, Part 4, Chapter 1, p. 285:
glosses: To cry out suddenly, from some strong emotion.
examples: text: Must she be forc’d, t’exclaime th’iniurious wrong?
Offred by him, whom she hath lou’d so long?
Nay, I will tell, and I durst almost sweare,
Edward will blush, when he his fault shall heare.
ref: 1603, Michael Drayton, “Alice Countesse of Salisburie, to the blacke Prince”, in The Barrons Wars in the Raigne of Edward the Second, London: N. Ling, page 31:
text: […] her aunt, after having stared at me a good while with a look of amazement, exclaimed, “In the name of heaven! Who art thou?”—
ref: 1748, [Tobias Smollett], chapter 40, in The Adventures of Roderick Random. […], volume (please specify |volume=I or II), London: […] [William Strahan] for J[ohn] Osborn […], →OCLC, page 28:
text: Without returning any direct reply, Miss Squeers, all at once, fell into a paroxysm of spiteful tears, and exclaimed that she was a wretched, neglected, miserable castaway.
ref: 1838 March – 1839 October, Charles Dickens, chapter 12, in The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby, London: Chapman and Hall, […], published 1839, →OCLC:
text: “Heavens!” exclaimed Nina, “the blue-stocking and the fogy!—and yours are pale blue, Eileen!—you’re about as self-conscious as Drina—slumping there with your hair tumbling à la Mérode! Oh, it's very picturesque, of course, but a straight spine and good grooming is better.[…]”
ref: 1907 August, Robert W[illiam] Chambers, chapter IX, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC:
text: You never pump your arm when you score, you never exclaim anything, you don’t even smile when you fire a perfect backhand straight down the line.
ref: 2017, André Aciman, “Manfred”, in Enigma Variations, New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, page 135:
glosses: To say suddenly and with strong emotion.
Synonyms: ejaculate. See also Thesaurus:shout
Derived terms: exclaimer