It's the Word of the Day podcast for November 22nd.
Today's word is paroxysm, spelled P-A-R-O-X-Y-S-M.
Paroxysm is a noun.
It's a formal word that refers to a sudden, strong feeling or uncontrollable expression of emotion.
In medical use,
paroxysm refers to a sudden attack or increase of symptoms of a disease that often occurs repeatedly.
Here's the word used in a sentence from Deadline by Bruce Herring.
Danny Ray was part of James Brown's cape routine for 45 years.
Assisting him in the song, please, please, please.
The godfather of soul would collapse in a paroxysm of feigned grief during the song,
being led away by a solicitous ray who draped the singer in a cape.
Brown would take a few steps, then return to the microphone.
Sometimes they eschewed the cape, and Brown was merely led away.
The word paroxysm didn't just burst onto the scene recently, its roots go back to ancient Greek.
The word ultimately erupted from the Greek verb paroxynine, which means to stimulate.
Oxynine, a parent of paroxynine, means to provoke and comes from oxys, a Greek word for sharp.
In its earliest known English uses in the 15th century,
paroxysm referred to a sudden attack or increase of symptoms of a disease,
such as pain, coughing, or shaking, that often occur again and again.
This sense is still in use,