rejoinder

plural rejoinders

1. lawThe defendant's answer to the replication.
2. A response that answers another response.

   "76. ... P-R8(N) mate! Certainly not 76... P-R8(Q), though threatening mate on the move in seven different ways--as 77 Q-N5 mate would have been the painful rejoinder."

   1953 March, Irving Chernev, “Chernev's Chess Corner”, in Chess Review

   1 more example

   “Depend upon it, landlord, that harpooneer is a dangerous man.” “He pays reg’lar,” was the rejoinder. “But come, it’s getting dreadful late, you had better be turning flukes—it’s a nice bed; Sal and me slept in that ere bed the night we were spliced [...]"

   1851 November 14, Herman Melville, “chapter 3”, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC

3. A quick response that involves disagreement or is witty, especially an answer to a question.

   "I'm starting to-morrow. This is perhaps the last time we shall ever meet." I made an appropriate rejoinder, and he smiled wanly.

   1919, W[illiam] Somerset Maugham, chapter 38, in The Moon and Sixpence, [New York, N.Y.]: Grosset & Dunlap Publishers […], →OCLC

   2 more examples

   I have passed perhaps more time than any other man of my age and country in visits and assemblies, where the polite persons of both sexes distinguish themselves; and could not without much grief observe how frequently both gentlemen and ladies are at a loss for questions, answers, replies, and rejoinders.

   1731 (date written), Simon Wagstaff [pseudonym; Jonathan Swift], “An Introduction to the Following Treatise”, in A Complete Collection of Genteel and Ingenious Conversation, […], London: […] B[enjamin] Motte […], published 1738, →OCLC, page ii

   The simplest rejoinder to all of Daenerys’ justifications is that this bloodshed could have been avoided. She was given a moment to choose, and she chose blind vengeance, the kind that eliminates any benevolence she hoped to bring to the seven kingdoms by burning it right out of the minds of anyone who saw her astride Drogon, mowing down men, women, and children with abandon.

   2019 May 12, Alex McLevy, “Westeros faces a disastrous final battle on the penultimate Game of Thrones (newbies)”, in The A.V. Club, archived from the original on 15 May 2019

   Synonyms: comeback, retort

4. USintellectual propertyRe-insertion, typically after allowance of a patent application, of patent claims that had been withdrawn from examination under a restriction requirement.

present singular third person rejoinders · participle present rejoindering · participle past rejoindered · past rejoindered

1. intransitiveTo issue a rejoinder.
2. transitiveTo say as a rejoinder.