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Back and forth

27 November 2017 · 9:16 pm · Word Up

By now you know what a palindrome is: it’s a series of letters or of individual words which, when spelled backwards, is identical to the frontward spelling. Bob can tell you about these:

Is it crazy how saying sentences backwards creates backwards sentences saying how crazy it is?

It occurred to a Canadian lad that there is no word for a series of letters that yields up a word in one direction and a wholly different word in the other:

I mean, Martin Gardner came up with the perfectly sensible “semordnilap” for these, but it never, ever caught on.

Hence: “Levidrome.” It’s “-drome,” from Greek dromos, direction, and “Levi,” the kid’s name.

A word from Oxford Dictionaries on this matter:

So why not “levidrome”?

(Via HelloGiggles.)

3 comments

  1. Roger O Green »

    28 November 2017 · 2:19 pm

    so should it be capitalized? I expect not, for lots of words are named for people.

  2. CGHill »

    28 November 2017 · 2:36 pm

    I think not, and I think the Earl of Sandwich might agree.

  3. December rambling #1: Sheila E. turns the big 6-0 | Ramblin' with Roger »

    15 December 2017 · 7:36 am

    […] Levidrome – a series of letters that yields up a word in one direction and a wholly different word in the other […]

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