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😍 To praise excitedly 🎤 To recite poetry
to rhapsodize

to rhapsodize

2 9.6
Speak or write about something with strong excitement
  • verb
  • /ˈræpsəˌdaɪz/
translation icon : hablar con entusiasmo
  • Who is ever going to rhapsodize so elegantly about the sights that greet one upon emerging?

And I, I have to say, when I look at the people who rhapsodize most about jobs in heavy industry, it's not jobs that they want to do themselves.

Examples

  • Joseph Joubert, a philosopher friend of Diderot, rhapsodized: "O Tahiti, how beautiful are your women and how gentle your men!"

    Fiction book (1991)

  • "And what a book it is!" he rhapsodized to his parents.

    Fiction book (2000)

  • I'm not gonna spend two hours listening to you rhapsodize about your family's home videos.

    The Family (2013)

  • I had a discussion with a friend of mine a while back who was rhapsodizing about Pandora.

    Blog text (26)

  • Instead, they were rhapsodizing about the beauties of the Chinese revolution.

    Blog text (18)

  • We rhapsodize over handspun, handwoven cotton textiles, but more often than not ignore the popular appeal of Lurex.

    Academic text (1990)

  • Consider Donald Farfrae's loss of self-control as he rhapsodizes to Lucetta about his style of profit-making:

    Fiction book (1996)

  • Zo chattered on, rhapsodizing about the glories of battle and the joys of maternity.

    Fiction book (1997)

  • "Olympia Drive, where spectacular views of the mighty Atlantic and piney mainland compete for our attention with the palaces of the great," rhapsodized a writer of the prior century.

    Fiction book (2002)

  • The teacher rhapsodized about the beauty of classical music during the lecture.

Synonyms

to rave
vsto rhapsodize
68 4.6

Speak about something in a very excited, positive way

is more about deep admiration expressed with passionate enthusiasm
to enthuse
vsto rhapsodize
4 6.5

To talk about something in an excited way

is more intense and shows greater passionate admiration
to speak volcanically
vsto rhapsodize
  • Literature
8.6

To talk with strong, sudden feeling, often loudly or angrily

focuses on enthusiastic praise rather than raw forceful delivery

Antonyms

to diminish
201 3.7

To become less in size, importance, or value

to understate
18 5.2

To make something seem smaller or less important than it really is

How Enthusiastic

to extol
7 7.5
to rhapsodize
2 9.6
to laud
  • Formal
30 7.7
to praise
331 1.0
comment
∞ 1.0
to mention
∞ 1.0

Surface Forms

rhapsodize infinitive
rhapsodized past
rhapsodized past participle
rhapsodizing present participle
rhapsodizes third person singular

Morphology

rhapsodize = rhapsody (transparent) = rhapsody + ize

Formed by the productive verb-forming suffix '-ize' on 'rhapsody', yielding a verb meaning 'to express in rhapsodic fashion', which is predictable from the base.

Etymology

Rhapsodize comes from an old Greek idea of 'stitching a song'—from rhaptein 'to stitch' and aoidē 'song'. So to rhapsodize today is to speak or write with great passion, as if sewing your words into a powerful song.