WordWealth: quandary

quan·da·ry \KWAHN-duh-ree; -dree\, n., pl. -ries.

The school commissioners...were in a quandary over the needful size of an "open-air playground." —— Jacob A. Riis, The Battle with the Slum

Still, none of this quite knits together, and one can imagine Calder's editor in a quandary: are we to see the compendium as a bran-tub of oddball histories intended only for dipping into, perhaps as an illustration of fate's crueller caprices, or is some greater scheme at work? Here the CVs of the gods provide a clue, because, as Calder points out, the trickster Anancy, the generous Ganesh, ferocious yet maternal Kali and the versatile Ogun are very human, and provide an overarching conception of potentialities. Humans may aim for the heavens but are all too capable of creating their own demons, and we are provided with the examples of Billie Holiday, Wittgenstein and Mother Jones, so it becomes clear that we "mongrels", trapped between fear of failure and the need to excel, find it impossible to follow the kind of persistently steady career path favoured by those searching for role models. —— Angus Calder; 'Gods, Mongrels and Demons', portrays a brantub of brief, eccentric lives prompts Christopher Fowler to spare a thought for those whose talents are unsuited to their times; Independent;  Nov 16, 2003

Once or twice as I stood waiting there for things to accomplish themselves, I could not resist an impulse to laugh at my miserable quandary. —— H.G. Wells, The Island of Doctor Moreau

When the Soviet Union could no longer afford the competition, its leaders decided to end the Cold War. A modified version of this argument holds that the American military buildup simply worsened the Soviet economic quandary; it was the straw that broke the camel's back. Neither the strong nor the weak version of the proposition that American defense spending bankrupted the Soviet economy and forced an end to the Cold War is sustained by the evidence. —— Richard Ned Lebow and Janice Gross Stein in 'Reagan and the Russians', the Cold War ended despite President Reagan's arms buildup, not because of it--or so former President Gorbachev told the authors; the Atlantic; 1994

Don...told me of the quandary that the authorities were in. Should the ruins be left untouched or should they be reconstructed for a new wave of tourists? —— Benjamin Hopkins, 'How to avoid the tourists in Peru'; Times (London), May 6, 2000

Look at Thesaurus in depth

Back index, 'Q'

Back index, 'P' | Next index, 'R'

> WordWealth, HOME

iNTERNET | The Atlantic-Quinion's coverage

> Language and Issues

> Word Court; Debate your word

> Word Watch

> Word Improvisation

> Words: English from a British viewpoint