The Underground Railroad: Stevens - North Carolina

by Colson Whitehead
Colson Whitehead's novel follows Cora, an enslaved woman, as she travels north in search of freedom. Infused with a hint of magical realism, this harrowing and groundbreaking book won both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award.

Here are links to our lists for the novel: Ajarry-Georgia, Ridgeway-South Carolina, Stevens-North Carolina, Ethel-Caesar, Indiana-The North
45 words 100 learners

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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. chortle
    laugh quietly or with restraint
    He and Carpenter chortled.
  2. ironic
    displaying incongruity between what is expected and what is
    The city had started hanging grave robbers lately—which was ironic or fitting depending on one’s perspective, as the bodies of the hanged were given to medical schools for dissection.
  3. cadaver
    the dead body of a human being
    “You’re not like that other sort,” Cobb told him one night when they carried a cadaver through the back door.
  4. dissection
    the act of cutting so as to separate into pieces
    It helped to be a wee disreputable when you were a young surgeon, especially when it came to materials for post-mortem dissection.
  5. pilfer
    make off with belongings of others
    Leave a prospect to too late in the evening and you were liable to discover someone else had pilfered the body first.
  6. ploy
    a maneuver in a game, conversation, or situation
    In his glory days, Carpenter elevated the ploys and chicanery of his trade to a devilish art.
  7. chicanery
    the use of tricks to deceive someone
    In his glory days, Carpenter elevated the ploys and chicanery of his trade to a devilish art.
  8. vigil
    a purposeful surveillance to guard or observe
    Eventually the body trade grew so reckless that relatives took to holding graveside vigils, lest their loved ones disappear in the night.
  9. mangy
    affected with a skin disease causing itching and hair loss
    Carpenter snarled when he said the word, a mangy dog hoarding his bone...
  10. smolder
    burn slowly and without a flame
    A faceless white posse sifted through the smoldering remains of the cabin, pulled up the trapdoor and delivered her into wretchedness.
  11. interment
    the ritual placing of a corpse in a grave
    Cora reached for her hair before realizing that after her interment there was no improving her appearance.
  12. raspy
    unpleasantly harsh or grating in sound
    She almost keeled over into the tracks as she howled after the train, her throat raspy and raw after days of privation.
  13. privation
    a state of extreme poverty
    She almost keeled over into the tracks as she howled after the train, her throat raspy and raw after days of privation.
  14. tarry
    leave slowly and hesitantly
    May the next traveler not tarry and keep moving up the line, all the way to liberty.
  15. succulent
    tasty and full of juice
    She gulped the air like water, the night sky the best meal she had ever had, the stars made succulent and ripe after her time below.
  16. evince
    give expression to
    For an agent of the underground railroad, presumably no stranger to peril and risk, he evinced a nervous personality.
  17. abstemious
    sparing in consumption of especially food and drink
    Martin told Cora later that this was Judge Tennyson, a respected figure in town when abstemious. This night he tottered.
  18. travesty
    a comedy characterized by broad satire
    She’d heard of them but had never witnessed their travesties; the colored evening at the theater in South Carolina offered different fare.
  19. wayward
    resistant to guidance or discipline
    The saloon keeper was a ruthless boss, beating and insulting the wayward slave at every turn, stealing wages and dignity, the hard image of northern white attitudes.
  20. prostrate
    stretched out and lying at full length along the ground
    The master whistled and two patrollers ushered the prostrate slave from the premises.
  21. nativity
    the event of being born
    The black horde has been beaten back, correcting the mistake made years ago at this nation’s nativity.
  22. untenable
    incapable of being defended or justified
    Even with the termination of the slave trade, in less than a generation the numbers were untenable...
  23. turncoat
    a disloyal person who betrays or deserts a cause
    Tipped by colored turncoats, the white enforcers organized elaborate ambushes, decimating the insurgents with gunfire and running them down on horseback, reinforced by the might of the United States Army.
  24. quash
    put down by force or intimidation
    The revolts were quashed, but the immensity of the colored population remained.
  25. seditious
    inciting action or rebellion
    In the amendments to the state’s constitution, the punishment for possessing seditious writings, or for aiding and abetting a colored person, was left to the discretion of local authorities.
  26. discretion
    freedom to act or judge on one's own
    In the amendments to the state’s constitution, the punishment for possessing seditious writings, or for aiding and abetting a colored person, was left to the discretion of local authorities.
  27. nemesis
    a personal foe or rival that cannot be easily defeated
    Folks informed on business rivals, ancient nemeses, and neighbors, recounting old conversations where the traitors had uttered forbidden sympathies.
  28. tribulation
    an annoying or frustrating or catastrophic event
    She wondered why there were only two kinds of weather: hardship in the morning, and tribulation at night.
  29. imbibe
    take in liquids
    Sometimes she neglected to ration her water, imbibing too much in the morning and staring with bitterness at the fountain the rest of the day. That damned dog cavorting in the spray.
  30. cavort
    play boisterously
    Sometimes she neglected to ration her water, imbibing too much in the morning and staring with bitterness at the fountain the rest of the day. That damned dog cavorting in the spray.
  31. almanac
    an annual publication arranged according to the calendar
    She tracked the regulars on their daily transits through the park, assembling notes and speculations like the compilers of her almanacs.
  32. rumination
    a calm, lengthy, intent consideration
    Once Cora had gleaned what she could from the yellowed pamphlets, she started on the old almanacs, with their projections and ruminations about the tides and stars, and bits of obscure commentary.
  33. travail
    use of physical or mental energy; hard work
    In this place to come, Caesar occasionally came for supper and they laughed ruefully about Randall and the travails of their escape, their eventual freedom.
  34. solstice
    when the sun is at its greatest distance from the equator
    It was a week before the summer solstice.
  35. complicity
    guilt as a confederate in a crime or offense
    The only thing that kept Ethel from turning her in, Cora decided, was complicity.
  36. wizened
    lean and wrinkled by shrinkage as from age or illness
    When Martin was little, the stock boy at the feed store was a wizened, stooped man named Jericho, freed many years previously.
  37. intransigence
    stubborn refusal to compromise or change
    Donald grunted in disapproval or shook his head at newspaper items about the latest slave incident, but it wasn’t clear if he judged the brutality of the master or the intransigence of the slave.
  38. ellipsis
    a mark indicating that words have been omitted
    Before Martin’s mother passed, it was her lot to translate the ellipses and muttered asides that constituted conversation between father and son.
  39. wispy
    thin and weak
    The fast-walking man who sat on the fountain’s rim, dragging his fingers through his wispy hair.
  40. scourge
    whip
    Under the Georgia sun, Connelly had recited verses while scourging field hands for infractions.
  41. infraction
    a violation of a law or rule
    Under the Georgia sun, Connelly had recited verses while scourging field hands for infractions.
  42. vignette
    a brief literary description
    The vignettes and parodies between the lunar tables and weather reports...confused her as much as the moral lessons in the holy book.
  43. machination
    a crafty and involved plot to achieve your ends
    She tried to imagine what the tide looked like, coming in and going out, nipping at the sand like a little dog, heedless of people and their machinations.
  44. wan
    lacking vitality as from weariness or illness or unhappiness
    Martin practiced a wan demeanor.
  45. lummox
    an awkward, foolish person
    “You say, you lummox,” Fiona said. “You said you checked the attic last time, but you didn’t, did you?”
Created on Tue Dec 12 15:03:53 EST 2017 (updated Tue Dec 19 11:16:52 EST 2017)

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