B

Question 1

belated

Answer 1

delayed past the proper time

ex: She called her
mother on January 5th to offer her a belated “Happy New
Year.”

Question 2

belie

Answer 2

to present a false or contradictory appearance

ex: Lena
Horne’s youthful appearance belied her long, distinguished
career in show business.

Question 3

benevolent

Answer 3

wishing or doing good. In old age,

EX: Carnegie used his wealth for benevolent purposes, donating
large sums to found libraries and schools.

Question 4

berate

Answer 4

to scold or criticize harshly.

EX: The judge angrily
berated the two lawyers for their unprofessional behavior.

Question 5

bereft

Answer 5

lacking or deprived of something.

EX: Bereft of
parental love, orphans sometimes grow up to be insecure.

Question 6

bombastic

Answer 6

inflated or pompous in style.

EX: Old-fashioned
bombastic political speeches don’t work on television, which
demands a more intimate style of communication.

Question 7

bourgeois

Answer 7

middle class or reflecting middle-class
values. 

EX: The Dadaists of the 1920s produced art deliberately
designed to offend bourgeois art collectors, with their taste for
respectable, refined, uncontroversial pictures.

Question 8

buttress

Answer 8

something that supports or strengthens; a projecting
structure of masrony or wood.

EX: The endorsement of the American
Medical Association is a powerful buttress for the claims made
about this new medicine.

EX: The buttress on the south wall of the
Medieval castle was beginning to crumble.

Question 9

camraderie

Answer 9

a spirit of friendship.

EX: Spending long days and
nights together on the road, the members of a traveling theater
group develop a strong sense of camaraderie.

Question 10

candor

Answer 10

openness, honesty, frankness.

EX: In his memoir about
the Vietnam War, former defense secretary McNamara
described his mistakes with remarkable candor.

Question 11

capricious

Answer 11

unpredictable, whimsical.

EX: The pop star
Madonna has changed her image so many times that each new
transformation now appears capricious rather than purposeful.

Question 12

carnivorous

Answer 12

meat-eating.

EX: The long, dagger-like teeth
of the Tyrannosaurus make it obvious that this was a
carnivorous dinosaur.

Question 13

carping

Answer 13

unfairly or excessively critical; querulous.

EX: New
York is famous for its demanding critics, but none is harder to
please than the carping John Simon, said to have singlehandedly
destroyed many acting careers.

Question 14

catalytic

Answer 14

bringing about, causing, or producing some
result.

EX: The conditions for revolution existed in America by
1765; the disputes about taxation that arose later were the
catalytic events that sparked the rebellion.

Question 15

caustic

Answer 15

burning, corrosive.

EX: No one was safe when the
satirist H. L. Mencken unleashed his caustic wit.

Question 16

censure

Answer 16

blame, condemnation.
EX: The news that the senator
had harassed several women brought censure from many
feminists.

Question 17

chaos

Answer 17

disorder, confusion, chance.

EX: The first few moments
after the explosion were pure chaos: no one was sure what had
happened, and the area was filled with people running and
yelling.

Question 18

circuitous

Answer 18

winding or indirect.

EX: We drove to the cottage
by a circuitous route so we could see as much of the
surrounding countryside as possible.

Question 19

circumlocution

Answer 19

speaking in a roundabout way; wordiness.

EX: Legal documents often contain circumlocutions that make them
difficult to understand.

Question 20

circumscribe

Answer 20

to define by a limit or boundary.

EX: Originally,
the role of the executive branch of government was clearly
circumscribed, but that role has greatly expanded over time.

Question 21

circumvent

Answer 21

to get around.

EX: When James was caught
speeding, he tried to circumvent the law by offering the police officer a bribe.

Question 22

clandestine

Answer 22

secret, surreptitious.

EX: As a member of the underground, Balas took part in clandestine meetings to discuss ways of sabotaging the Nazi forces.

Question 23

cloying

Answer 23

overly sweet or sentimental.
EX: The deathbed scenes in the novels of Dickens are famously cloying: as Oscar Wilde said, “One would need a heart of stone to read the death
of Little Nell without dissolving into tears . . . of laughter.”

Question 24

cogent

Answer 24

forceful and convincing.

EX: The committee members were won over to the project by the cogent arguments of the chairman.

Question 25

cognizant

Answer 25

aware, mindful.

EX: Cognizant of the fact that it was getting late, the master of ceremonies cut short the last speech.

Question 26

cohesive

Answer 26

sticking together, unified.

EX: An effective military unit must be a cohesive team, all its members working together for a common goal.

Question 27

collaborate

Answer 27

to work together.

EX: To create a truly successful movie, the director, writers, actors, and many others must collaborate closely.

Question 28

colloquial

Answer 28

informal in language; conversational.
EX: Some expressions from Shakespeare, such as the use of thou and thee, sound formal today but were colloquial English in Shakespeare’s time.

Question 29

competent

Answer 29

having the skill and knowledge needed for a
particular task; capable.
EX: Any competent lawyer can draw up a will.

Question 30

complacent

Answer 30

smug, self-satisfied.
EX: Until recently, American auto makers were complacent, believing that they would continue to be successful with little effort.

Question 31

composure

Answer 31

composure (noun) calm, self-assurance.
EX: The company’s president managed to keep his composure during his speech even when the teleprompter broke down, leaving him without a script.

Question 32

conciliatory

Answer 32

seeking agreement, compromise, or reconciliation.
EX: As a conciliatory gesture, the union leaders agreed to postpone a strike and to continue negotiations with management.