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Examples
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This astonishing linguistic achievement, first appearing in full in 1928, was a bookshelf-breaking set of volumes containing almost half a million words and two million quotations illustrating word usage over the centuries-and a decent chunk of those quotations came from a former US Civil War veteran who eventually savaged his own genitals with a pen (performing an "autopeotomy") while residing in a UK hospital for the criminally insane.
Ars Technica 2010
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With his cheeky way with a tale ( 'It is a brave and foolhardy and desperate man who will perform an autopeotomy' he writes of Minor's self-mutilation), Winchester celebrates a gloomy life brightened by devotion to a quietly noble, nearly anonymous task.
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And so I did, and it duly was and I duly am, and there autopeotomy lies for ever, part of the glittering marvels that make up the English language and which, on Wednesday, is set to celebrate the creation of its one millionth word, according to the Global Language Monitor, a Texas-based association of academics that tracks the use of new words.
oroboros commented on the word autopeotomy
"It is a brave, foolhardy, and desperate man who will perform an autopeotomy, in which one removes one's own organ--the more so when the operation is done in an unsterile environment and with a pen knife."
The Professor and the Madman, Simon Winchester
March 29, 2008
bilby commented on the word autopeotomy
An account of its genesis, by non other than Mr Winchester, is here.
June 6, 2009