Word of the Day for Saturday, February 4, 2012
caprice \kuh-PREES\, noun:
1. A sudden, unpredictable change, as of one's mind or the weather.
2. A tendency to change one's mind without apparent or adequate motive; whimsicality; capriciousness.
3. Music. Capriccio.
Does she turn, thought he, thus, from one to the other, with no preference but of accident or caprice? Is her favour thus light of circulation?
-- Fanny Burney, "Camilla, or a Picture of Youth"
You lose, you gain—it's all caprice. The omnipotence of caprice. The likelihood of reversal. Yes, the unpredictable reversal and its power.
-- Philip Roth, "The Humbling"
Caprice is from the Italian word capriccio which means a sudden start or motion. It comes from the word capro meaning goat.
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