Word: thumbnailing
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Parodies of TIME writing usually begin like "Outraged was snaggletoothed, bilious, ambidextrous Herman Zilch ..." But nowadays TIME editors do not think highly of backward syntax except as an occasional way of emphasizing a point. Spacesaving sometimes forces us to use a string of adjectives to give a thumbnail sketch, but we prefer nouns that make adjectives unnecessary...
...brought Britain through the greatest war in its history reported last week to the nation. In a 35-minute speech, marked by a halting delivery as if he were very tired, Prime Minister Winston Churchill: ¶Reviewed Britain's heroic role in a thumbnail history of World...
...Crowe covered his chest wound with his poncho, covered his face with his helmet. A shell fragment tore through the poncho, pierced his chest in two more places. Five other fragments hit him in the left arm and shoulder, another in the right leg. A sliver tore off his thumbnail. A doctor who examined him said, "Not much chance...
Crowe croaked: "First thing you do, cut off that hanging thumbnail. It's damned annoying." Leatherneck's Career. Like many an other famed Marine (e.g., Generals "Lem" Shepherd and "Red Mike" Edson, Colonel "Chesty" Puller), Kentucky-born Jim Crowe started in the ranks. He was an enlisted man up to 1934, when he became a Marine gunner (warrant officer). After Pearl Harbor, he was commissioned a captain ("I was never a lousy second looey...
...days later Winston Churchill lifted the lid in the House of Commons. The Prime Minister gave a thumbnail sketch of V-2 in action, said that "casualties and damage have so far not been heavy" and that "the scale and effect of these attacks have not hitherto been significant...