Longueur Long Gur Noun Long Dull Passage Work Literature

A long and dull passage in a work of literature.

[From French longueur (length), from Latin longus (long). Ultimately from the Indo-European root del- (long), which also gave us lounge, lunge, linger, longitude, long, belong, and along. Earliest documented use: 1791.]

“Even the sainted Douglas Adams wasn’t above the occasional infuriatingly indulgent longueur, such as basing the whole of his least good book on an extended metaphor involving cricket.” - Euan Ferguson; And Another Thing; The Observer (London, UK); Oct 11, 2009.