Literary notes about Prevaricator (AI summary)
The term “prevaricator” is deployed in literature to designate characters who habitually twist the truth or engage in subterfuge, often embodying either a humorous self-deprecation or a pointed character indictment. Authors use it as a flexible label—sometimes light-heartedly to tease a character’s penchant for exaggeration or evasiveness, as when someone is affectionately chided for their storytelling quirks ([1], [2]), and at other times as a scathing accusation in moral or legal contexts ([3], [4]). Its versatility is further underscored in classic works, where figures such as those in Cervantes’s narrative are rebuked for their dishonest speech ([5]), establishing “prevaricator” as a rich marker of both character flaw and narrative irony.
- "No," she said, "you're such an artistic prevaricator that I'll give you one dinner at Cuyler's as your well-earned reward."
— from Betty Wales, Sophomore by Edith K. (Edith Kellogg) Dunton - So Max, while not wishing to deliberately tell the man to his face that he was a prevaricator, set about catching him in a little trap.
— from At Whispering Pine Lodge by Lawrence J. Leslie - At this the judge said, “Take him away: prevaricator!
— from The Public School Word-book A conribution to to a historical glossary of words phrases and turns of expression obsolete and in current use peculiar to our great public schools together with some that have been or are modish at the universities by John Stephen Farmer - Then said the Judge, "Take him away, prevaricator!
— from George Fox: An Autobiography by George Fox - "Cavilling, not gravelling," said Don Quixote, "thou prevaricator of honest language, God confound thee!"
— from Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
