Bryson's Dictionary For Writers And Editors (v5.0) (29 page)

Marianske Lazne.
Czech spa more widely known by its German name of
Marienbad.

Marie Antoinette.
(1755–1793) Austrian-born queen of France (1774–1793) and wife of King Louis XVI.

marionette.

markka.
Former unit of Finnish currency.

Marlboro cigarettes.

Marmara, Sea of.

marmoset.
Monkey.

Maroochydore,
Queensland, Australia.

marquee.
Large tent used for entertaining; in the United States it signifies a projection over an entrance, especially at the front of a theater.

Marquesas Islands.
Archipelago in South Pacific.

Marrakesh,
Morocco.

Marriage-à-la-Mode.
(Hyphens.) Play by John Dryden (1672).

Marriott.
Hotels group.

Marsalis, Wynton.
(1961–) U.S. musician.

Marseille
(or
Marseilles
), France. The French national anthem is
“La Marseillaise..

marshal.
Not
-all.

Marshall Islands.
Island nation in the Pacific Ocean; capital Majuro.

Marshall Plan,
officially the European Recovery Program, was an assistance program to help European nations rebuild after World War II. It was named for
George C. Marshall
(1880-1959), secretary of state.

Marshalsea Prison,
London.

Martin Luther King Day
is observed in the United States on the third Monday of January.

Marunouchi.
Financial district of Tokyo.

Marylebone.
Roads, district, and church in London.

Mary, Queen of Scots.
(1542–1587) Scottish queen, executed for treason. Some sources write her name without the comma.

Masaccio.
(1401–1428) Italian painter; real name Tommaso di Ser Giovanni di Mone Cassai.

Maserati.
Italian sports car.

Mason-Dixon line.
Boundary line between Maryland and Pennsylvania surveyed by
Charles Mason
and
Jeremiah Dixon
in 1763–1767, traditionally regarded as the dividing line between the North and the South in the United States.

Massapequa, Massapequa Park, East Massapequa,
etc., New York.

masseur
(masc.),
masseuse
(fem.).

MasterCard.

masterful, masterly.
Most authorities continue to insist that we observe a distinction between these two—namely that
masterly
should apply to that which is adroit and expert and
masterful
to that which is imperious and domineering. Useful as the distinction might be, it has to be noted that no leading dictionary insists on it and most don't even indicate that such a distinction exists.

Matabeleland.
Region of Zimbabwe.

Matagordo Bay,
Texas.

Matamoros,
Mexico, but
Matamoras,
Pennsylvania.

materialize
is usually no more than a somewhat pompous synonym for
occur, develop
, or
happen
.

Mathewson, Christy.
(1880–1925) American baseball pitcher.

Mato Grosso,
Brazil.

Matthau, Walter.
(1920–2000) American actor.

matzo.
Type of unleavened bread; pl.
matzos
(or
matzoth
or
matzot
).

Maudsley Hospital,
London. Not
Maude-.

Maundy Thursday.
Not
Maunday
. The day before Good Friday.

Maupassant, (Henri René Albert) Guy de.
(1850–1893) French author.

Mauretania, Mauritania.
The first is the spelling for the ancient African country and two famous Cunard ships. The second is the spelling of the modern-day African country formally known as the Islamic Republic of Mauritania.

mausoleum.

mauvaise honte.
(Fr.) Dishonest or needless shame.

Mayne, Thom.
(1944–) American architect.

mayonnaise.

Mazatlán,
Mexico.

mazel tov.
(Heb.) “Good luck.”

mazurka.
Polish dance.

Mazzini, Giuseppe.
(1805–1872) Italian republican and revolutionary.

Mbabane.
Capital of Swaziland.

Mbeki, Thabo (Mvuyelwa).
(1942–) South African president (1999–).

McAfee Coliseum,
Oakland.

McCarran International Airport,
Las Vegas.

McCarthy, Cormac.
(1933–) American novelist.

McCarthy, Eugene (Joseph).
(1916–2005) American Democratic politician.

McCarthy, Joseph (Raymond).
(1900–1957) U.S. senator notorious for a prolonged campaign against Communists during congressional hearings, known as the Army-McCarthy hearings, in the 1950s.

McClellan, George B(rinton).
(1826–1865) American general and politician.

McCormick, Cyrus.
(1809–1884) American manufacturer and inventor.

McCormick Place.
Convention center in Chicago.

McCowen, Alec.
(1925–) British actor.

McCrea, Joel.
(1905–1990) American film actor.

McCullers, Carson.
(1917–1967) American novelist and playwright.

McDonald's
(note apos.) for the fast-food chain. The company is the McDonald's Corporation.

McDonnell Douglas Corporation.
Now part of Boeing.

McDowall, Roddy.
(1928–1998) British-born American actor.

McEnroe, John.
(1959–) American tennis player.

McEwan, Geraldine.
(1932–) British actress.

McEwan, Ian.
(1948–) British novelist.

McGillis, Kelly.
(1957–) American actress.

McGill University,
Montreal.

McGoohan, Patrick.
(1928–) American actor.

McGovern, George.
(1922–) American Democratic politician.

McGraw-Hill Companies, The.
U.S. media and financial services company.

McGregor, Ewan.
(1971–) Scottish actor.

McGuffey Eclectic Reader
(not
McGuffey's
) is the formal name for the schoolbook popularly known as
McGuffey's Reader;
named for the educator
W. H. McGuffey
(1800–1873).

McGwire, Mark.
(1963–) American baseball player.

McIntosh apple
(after the Canadian John McIntosh), but
Macintosh
computer.

McJob.
(Cap.
M
, cap.
J
.) Slang term for a low-wage job, usually in the service sector.

McKinley, Mount.
Alaskan mountain that is the highest peak in North America (20,320 feet; 6,194 meters), alternative name
Denali.
It stands within Denali National Park and Preserve. Mount McKinley was named for
William McKinley
(1843–1901), U.S. president (1897–1901).

McLean,
Virginia, suburb of Washington, D.C.; pronounced
muklane'
.

McShane, Ian.
(1942–) British actor.

ME.
Short for
myalgic encephalomyelitis,
a type of chronic malaise; also, postal abbreviation of Maine.

mea culpa.
(Lat.) “My fault.”

mean, median.
Each of these terms has a very specific meaning.
The American Heritage Dictionary
defines
mean
as a number that typifies a set of numbers, such as a geometric mean or an arithmetic mean, or the average value of a set of numbers.
Median
signifies the middle value in a distribution, above and below which lie an equal number of values. Both terms are at best vaguely understood by the general reader, and thus your most prudent course of action is to use them extremely sparingly in anything other than technical writing.

measurable.

Mecklenburg.
Former state in Germany.

Medal of Honor.
Not
Congressional Medal of Honor
. Highest U.S. military decoration.

Médecins Sans Frontières.
Medical aid charity, known in the United States as Doctors Without Borders.

Medellín,
Colombia.

media
is a plural. The singular is
medium
. Television is a medium; newspapers and television are media. However,
mediums
is the correct plural for describing spiritualists.

Medici.
Leading family of Renaissance Florence, whose more noted members were
Cosimo de' Medici
(1389–1464), called Cosimo the Elder;
Lorenzo de' Medici
(1449–1492), called Lorenzo the Magnificent;
Giovanni de' Medici
(1475–1521), later Pope Leo X; and
Giulio de' Medici
(1478–1534), later Pope Clement VII. The French spelling is normally used for
Catherine de Medicis
(1519–1589), wife of Henry II of France, and
Marie de Medicis
(1573–1642), wife of Henry IV of France.

medieval.

mediocre.

meerschaum.
White claylike mineral traditionally used to make pipe bowls.

meet, mete.
In the sense of justice or punishment, the first means suitable, and the second means to allot. Thus one metes out punishment, but a fitting punishment is meet.

mega.
Prefix meaning one million. A megabyte in computing is a million bytes (or a thousand kilobytes).

megahertz
(one word, no cap.), but the abbreviation is MHz.

megalomania.

Meigs Field.
Chicago airport; formally Merril (not
-ll
) C. Meigs Field. It closed in 2003.

Meiji.
Reign of Emperor Mutsuhito (1867–1912), marking Japan's emergence as a modern industrial state.

mein Herr, meine Dame.
(Ger.) Sir, lady; pl.
meine Herren, meine Damen.

Meir, Golda.
(1898–1978) Israeli prime minister (1969–1974).

Meissen porcelain.
Named for the German city in which it originated.

meitnerium.
Chemical element.

melamine.
A type of plastic. It is not capitalized.

Melanchthon, Philipp
(or
Philip
). (1497–1560) German academic; colleague of Martin Luther and a leader of the Reformation.

melee.
In French,
mêlée.

mellifluous.
Sounding sweet.

memento,
pl.
mementoes.

memorabilia.
Note that the word is a plural.

memorandums.

Memorial Day.
Day commemorating the war dead, held the last Monday in May; originally called Decoration Day.

ménage à trois.
(Fr.) Sexual relationship among three people living together.

menagerie.

Mencken, H. L.
(for Henry Louis). (1880–1956) American writer, critic, and editor.

Mendel, Gregor Johann.
(1822–1884) Austrian botanist whose work became the basis of modern genetics.

Mendelssohn, Felix.
(1809–1847) German composer; full name Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy.

Mendes da Rocha, Paulo.
(1928–) Brazilian architect.

Mendès-France, Pierre.
(1907–1982) French prime minister (1954–1955).

meningitis.
Inflammation of the
meninges,
or cranial membranes; note that
meninges
is plural; a single membrane is a
meninx.

Menninger Clinic, the.
Psychiatric hospital founded in 1925, moved to Houston, Texas, in 2003; the
Menninger Foundation
remains in Topeka.

menorah.
Seven-branched candelabrum used in Jewish worship in ancient times; today's Hanukkah menorah has nine branches.

Menorca.
Spanish name for Minorca.

Menotti, Gian Carlo.
(1911–2007) Italian-born American composer.

men's, women's.
However eagerly department stores and the like may strive to dispense with punctuation in their signs (writing “Mens Clothing” or “Womens Department”), the practice is subliterate and to be avoided in any serious writing. Equally incorrect, if slightly less common, is placing the apostrophe after the “s” (e.g., “mens' hats,” “womens' facials”). However, note that the apostrophe
is
discarded in such compounds as
menswear
and
womenswear
. See also
CHILDREN'S
.