extemporize
verbEtymology From extempore + -ize.
1
To perform or speak without prior planning or thought; to act in an impromptu manner; to improvise.
- "Will you please tell me whose music you have been playing?" . . . "It's nobody's, miss." "Do you mean you have been extemporizing all this time?"1881, George MacDonald, chapter 35, in Mary Marston:
- But while some of his predecessors liked to extemporize, Obama prefers the message to be just so.2009 March 5, Peter Baker, “The (very) scripted president”, in New York Times, retrieved 08 Nov 2011:
2
To adapt, improvise, or devise action or speech in an impromptu or spontaneous manner.
- As the music came fresher on their ears, they danced to its cadence, extemporizing new steps and attitudes.1860, Nathaniel Hawthorne, chapter 10, in The Marble Faun:
- The small jelly-speck, which we call the amoeba, has no organs save what it can extemporize as occasion arises.1879, Samuel Butler, chapter 5, in Evolution, Old & New:
3 more examples
- The wine runs into pitchers, washing-basins, shards, chamber- vessels, and other extemporized receptacles.1906, Thomas Hardy, The Dynasts, Part Second, Act Third:
- His most famous words — "I have a dream" — were extemporized.2003 August 25, Emily Eakin, “How King Shaped The Dream”, in New York Times, retrieved 08 Nov 2011:
- The evidence of my eyes does not lead me to the conclusion that Woody Brown is communicating via a letter board. It leads me to the conclusion that he is randomly tapping the board and that his mother is extemporizing, whether consciously or not.2026 April 2, Jill Bearup, 9:54 from the start, in Is The New York Times Punking Us?, via YouTube:
- Synonyms
- improvise, think on one's feet, devise
- Derived terms
- extemporizer
- Related terms
- extemporaneous, extempore, extemporization, extemporisation, temporalize, temporize, play it by ear, off the cuff, off the top of one's head