'I used to be poor, then I met Shashi Tharoor and realized that I'm impecunious'
Memes like this are aplenty on most social feeds. If you haven't already shared it yourself, you certainly had to address it on family groups on WhatsApp, where long-forgotten uncles and aunts share videos of their young kids speaking unbroken lines in missionary school-English, an ability considered second only to telekinesis, to much digital-applause.
Though at first glance it might appear a jibe at Shashi Tharoor and his masterful command over the language, the meme speaks volumes of our own obsession with English, our technicolour image of what it represents and the grim view of what we are without it.
Just knowing English and being able to converse alone would not do, we learn soon enough. We need to know more words than our neighbour, the longer the better. Editions of Reader's Digest grew to staggering heights on our desk, when we are young. 'Word Power', we are told, will change our lives. It is only after the tyranny of school that some of us are able to forfeit this quest.
Now, for those who still persist, a new book that's hitting stands in September attempts to shower you with even more unusual words from every letter of the alphabet.
Tharoorosaurus by Shashi Tharoor is a collection of fun facts and anecdotes behind each of these words. Published by Penguin Random House, the book is certain to be a welcome relief from the kerfuffle of our times.
The word 'Tharoorosaurus' has been around since Amul first made it popular in 2017, the year of big words.
The genesis of the meme at the head of this article too dates back to 2017. It was just after Tharoor's famous 'Farrago' tweet in May in rebuttal to a statement made by Arnab Goswami of Republic TV.
Tharoor, then a two-time MP from Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala, tweeted "Exasperating farrago of distortions, misrepresentations & outright lies being broadcast by an unprincipled showman masquerading as a journalist".
Farrago was until then a word used in closed societies, of lawyers and journalists, with not a single search made for its meaning for weeks (according to Google). After the tweet, however, search results numbered in hundreds.
Shashi Tharoor has admitted in an article that it is, in fact, a word he excessively used to silence his debating opponents at St Stephen's College, his alma mater, in the 1970s.
The word also figured in a 1993 article that Tharoor wrote for The Washington Post and in his 1997 book India from Midnight to the Millennium.
Tharoor has since been called 'Mr Farrago' on Twitter, a name that is rekindled time and again when he lights up the micro-blogging site with his wide lexicon.
In 2019, Tharoor, announcing his new book, The Paradoxical Prime Minister, unleashed a 29-letter-long tongue-twister into the Twitter wilderness. Floccinaucinihilipilification.
The tweet reads, "My new book, THE PARADOXICAL PRIME MINISTER, is more than just a 400-page exercise in floccinaucinihilipilification. Pre-order it to find out why!"
Tharoor admitted later that, after the antics of 'farrago', it was indeed a deliberate attempt on his part to grab eyeballs and draw attention to his book. The tweet has amassed a staggering 95,000 likes and 38,000 retweets so far.
That's not all – there are still words like lalochezia, farrago, rodomontade, webaqoof and snollygoster that have all since fashioned into existence after Tharoor resurrected them, especially in Lutyen's Delhi.
Now, Onmanorama has reasons to believe that this Tharoorosaurus is a compilation of Shashi Tharoor's articles where he elaborates on the origins of each word and the particular instance where he had to wield it.
The publisher has not revealed details apart from the fact that this would be a collection of unusual words and anecdotes.
Shashi Tharoor, the longest serving lawmaker from the prestigious Thiruvananthapuram constituency, makes just as many headlines for his lexicon and eloquent speeches as he does with his politics. He is the bestselling author of twenty books which have won numerous literary awards including the Sahitya Akademi award and a Commonwealth Writers' Prize.
He has been Under Secretary-General of the United Nations and Minister of State for Human Resource Development and Minister of State for External Affairs.
A three-time member of the Lok Sabha from Thiruvananthapuram, he is also one who was pained at having to forgo punctuation while building his Twitter bio.
