wordster

plural wordsters

1. One who is skilled at using words; a wordsmith.First known use early 20th c.

   I know a lie when I hear one, even from a wordster like you.

   2002, Adam Davies, The Frog King: A Love Story, New York, N.Y.: Riverhead Books, →ISBN

   4 more examples

   The toiler toils. The wordster words. And you say all your prayers in words. Toil is always alive. But words are dead.

   1903 January, H[orace] T[raubel], “Collect”, in Horace Traubel, editor, The Conservator, number 11, Philadelphia, Pa.: Innes & Sons, 200 S. Tenth Street, →OCLC, page 162, column 1

   The style is that of the trained reporter, ready and fluent; the craft of the wordster is here seen at its best.

   1923, Flora Warren Seymour, editor, The Step Ladder; a Monthly Journal of Bookly Ascent, volumes 7–8, Cedar Rapids, Iowa: The Bookfellows, →OCLC, page 117

   So long has it been since Charles Cotton was a wit and a wordster that a short biographical notice well may precede any remarks about this book.

   1924, Julius Weiss Friend, editor, The Double Dealer, New Orleans, La.: The Double Dealer Publishing Co., →OCLC, page 360, column 1

   At his command, a team of authentically be-kilted wordsters has combed the highlands and islands of Scotland to bring you this, our tribute to a very special country.

   1990, Punch: Or The London Charivari, volume 299, London: Punch, →OCLC, page 14

2. One who studies words.

   Wordsters of etymological persuasion also hope to be sitting in the catbird seat when it comes to locating the origins of colorful phrases.

   1994, Richard Lederer, Adventures of a Verbivore, New York, N.Y.: Pocket Books, →ISBN, page 5

   1 more example

   Quite how complete or relevant all this information is to professional wordsters remains to be seen, though desktop publishers will find hyphenation rules included […]

   1988, Language Technology, Amsterdam: INK International, →OCLC, page 53, column 1

3. derogatoryOne who uses words instead of actions; a hypocrite, a verbalist.

   He was a wordster, a dreamer; there was nothing at the back of his rose-colored ideas.

   1919, J[ohn] C[ollis] Snaith, chapter XII, in The Undefeated, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC, page 64

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   It is not easy to analyse the personality of the [London County] Council, but it is a sharply-marked personality. […] It despises the wordster and the tonguester. It is, in short, a big committee rather than a Parliament.

   1909, James Douglas, “Spring Gardens”, in Adventures in London, London; New York, N.Y.: Cassell and Company, Limited, →OCLC, page 230

   If [Alexander] Kerensky had been a man of insight and action, instead of being a wordster, if he had joined forces with Korniloff [Lavr Kornilov] instead of betraying him, quite another form of government would have been possible and operative in Russia to-day.

   1921, Henry Arthur Jones, “Letter Five: Mr. Wells Invents a New Kind of Honesty”, in My Dear Wells: A Manual for the Haters of England: Being a Series of Letters upon Bolshevism, Collectivism, Internationalism, and the Distribution of Wealth Addressed to Mr. H. G. Wells, 2nd edition, London: Eveleigh Nash & Grayson Ltd., 148, Strand, →OCLC, page 37

   Why should the prospect, however remote, of a communist government in Vietnam cause us to panic. Mr. Menzies' alarm causes no surprise; he lives in the past. In any case, he is a mere wordster, a trifler when it comes to foreign affairs, which have always been his Achilles heel.

   1965, Nation, numbers 160–184, Sydney, N.S.W.: Nation, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 145, column 1