Word: patriarchal
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...night he gathered a few tuxedoed stalwarts from the Hill for roast sirloin au jus and crépes suzette. That wise and respected patriarch, Vermont's George Aiken, who is retiring from the Senate, was on his right, and Nixon hoisted a glass to Aiken's 33 years of legislative wisdom...
According to the village patriarch, Man Hing-lap, the bulldozers have aroused the dragon from his slumbers and he is now breathing vengeance on the local population. The first victim was Man's grandson, who came down with a mysterious fever. A few days later, seven other of his grandchildren were similarly stricken. Aghast, Man called for his local diviner, who quickly appraised the situation: the dragon's nose had been cut off by a bulldozer; in revenge, the dragon had put a curse on the whole Man clan, which since the 1200s has made...
...Homecoming's plot is familiar by now: a college professor in America (Michael Jayston) brings his wife (Vivien Merchant) back to London to meet his family: a malevolent patriarch (Paul Rogers), a fey uncle (Cyril Cusack) and the patriarch's two unmarried sons-an aspiring boxer (Terence Rigby) and a seedily elegant hoodlum type (Ian Holm). The professor separates himself from his family and stands aside as his wife is drawn into it. It would seem that the men humiliate her, but she thrives on their abusive attentions. Indeed, by taunting and captivating each of them sexually...
Both peoples, their scriptures tell them, are the children of that primeval patriarch Abraham: the Arabs the offspring of his son Ishmael, the Jews of his son Isaac. Both hammered out their visions of a single God in the forge of the desert, and both fought to win a stronghold for those visions against the tribes of idolaters then around them...
...everyone got the idea straight. A farmer wanted a worker for "gardening, tinkering and the care of 20 goats." One family took in an elderly woman and demanded that she serve dinner to 22 people every night. In another household, the 88-year-old patriarch made unrequited passes at the new granny...