Q From Harry Sayle: I was taught in high school that there is no
such word as enthuse, I hear a lot of people using it in
sentences such as, ‘I am enthused about the ballgame’. Shouldn’t
it just be enthusiastic? Enthuse is in the dictionary, so was my
high school teacher wrong years ago, or was the word added
because it is so commonly used? A Enthuse is one of those words
that once made traditionalists quiver with rage. Even now it has
not been fully accepted by everyone. Your teacher was going too
far in saying that the word didn’t exist, though that vehement
denial may just have been a way of impressing on young minds
that it was a word to be avoided. As you say, it’s now in every
dictionary. It also has a long history in the language — it was
used as long ago as 1827 by a Scots traveller in North America:
“My humble exertions will I trust convey and enthuse, and draw
attention to the beautifully varied verdure of N.W. America”.
Grammarians disliked it at the time because it’s a back-
formation. If a word lo