Grammatical questions: Surge

[elfs]

I was writing a sex scene this morning and I wanted to describe my character's ardour as 'resurgent' before realizing that that didn't make sense. It was, after all, the first time he was having this experience. So now I'm left wondering: if you can be resurgent, can you resurge? Can you be surgent? What about insurgent? Is it possible to insurge somewhere?

Comments

[dossy.livejournal.com]

That's like asking what the difference between "flammable" and "inflammable" is.

Head a'splody.

[codeamazon.livejournal.com]

"redeploy" in the military sense has always *really* bothered me. Just seems backwards..that should be heading out for at least the second time, right? No...

[lucky-otter.livejournal.com]

Ah, but it is - it's just that you don't think of being on a base somewhere in a peaceful area as being "deployed".

Apparently they do.

[doodlesthegreat.livejournal.com]

THE SURGE IS WORKING! ^_^

[sirfox.livejournal.com]

Well... are we talking about a burning passion for a particular person, or just the roiling tides of lust?

If it's the latter, the character's felt it before. (and resurgent would apply) Maybe a crush, or just an evening spent wanking off to porn, he's felt it before, just possibly not as strongly, since it looks like he'll be able to act on it with somebody else's help for the first time.

Otherwise... well, time for Mr. Thesaurus again.

[wookie-cd.livejournal.com]

since those latter-tense words are modifications on the word surge, I suppose for the first time that would leave "surging ardour"

[phred1973.livejournal.com]

IAWTC

Joo Win teh Intarwebz!

[rapier.livejournal.com]

...

Yeah, I don't have anything constructive to add. This entry got me reminiscent of a soda I haven't had in years.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_candide_/]

That's cuz language is like a lava-lamp (to paraphrase John McWhorter).

Really, language grammar & word origin seldom makes sense. I recall learning, in a class on Middle-High German (while studying in Germany, mind you), that Middle-High German had a word that meant, "the opposite of 'not'." It would get roughly-translated as, "something," or "somewhat." But, that's not what it meant 800 years ago. It meant, "the opposite of 'not'."

I have trouble wrapping my brain around that, especially with all of my mathematical background. ^_^ Still, a group of central-Europeans from 800-1000 years ago had need of such a word, and its subtle shades of meaning ... whatever they were ... that made it differ from their words for, "something," or "somewhat."

So, as McWhorter said, language is a Lava Lamp. (He also said, "Languages are full of Charlie Brown heads.")