author
pronunciation
How to pronounce author in British English:
UK [ˈɔːθə(r)]
How to pronounce author in American English:
US [ˈɔːθər]
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- Noun:
- writes (books or stories or articles or the like) professionally (for pay)
- someone who originates or causes or initiates something
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- Verb:
- be the author of
Word Origin
- author
- author: [14] Latin auctor originally meant ‘creator, originator’; it came from auct-, the past participial stem of augēre, which as well as ‘increase’ (as in English augment) meant ‘originate’. But it also developed the specific sense ‘creator of a text, writer’, and brought both these meanings with it into English via Old French autor. Forms with -th- began to appear in the mid 16th century (from French), and originally the-th- was just a spelling variant of -t-, but eventually it affected the pronunciation.While the ‘writing’ sense has largely taken over author, authority [13] (ultimately from Latin auctōritās) and its derivatives authoritative and authorize have developed along the lines of the creator’s power to command or make decisions.=> auction, augment
- author (n.)
- c. 1300, autor "father," from Old French auctor, acteor "author, originator, creator, instigator (12c., Modern French auteur), from Latin auctorem (nominative auctor) "enlarger, founder, master, leader," literally "one who causes to grow," agent noun from auctus, past participle of augere "to increase" (see augment). Meaning "one who sets forth written statements" is from late 14c. The -t- changed to -th- 16c. on mistaken assumption of Greek origin. ...[W]riting means revealing onesself to excess .... This is why one can never be alone enough when one writes, why even night is not night enough. ... I have often thought that the best mode of life for me would be to sit in the innermost room of a spacious locked cellar with my writing things and a lamp. Food would be brought and always put down far away from my room, outside the cellar's outermost door. The walk to my food, in my dressing gown, through the vaulted cellars, would be my only exercise. I would then return to my table, eat slowly and with deliberation, then start writing again at once. And how I would write! From what depths I would drag it up! [Franz Kafka]
- author (v.)
- 1590s, from author (n.). Revived 1940s, chiefly U.S. Related: Authored; authoring.
Synonym
hack screenwriter elegist writer tragedian historiographer scribbler comedist chronicler fictioneer playwright scenarist romancer penman epistoler journalist poet librettist fabulist biographer historian wordsmith novelist storyteller dramaturge dramatist bard composer essayist annalist pamphleteer lyricist belletrist
Antonym
Example
- 1. Tom taulli is a noted finance author and blogger .
- 2. Does the author make any assumptions that need examining ?
- 3. The author was an emmy award-winning tv news correspondent .
- 4. Full disclosure : the author is a member of iiss .
- 5. They asked the landfill team to author national guidelines that were disseminated throughout china .