remark
Pluralremarks
Verbremarks, remarking, remarked
Pluralremarks
Formsremarks, remarking, remarked
- 1A casual comment, observation, or statement, often made in passing.
His offhand remark about the budget sparked a heated debate.
She opened her speech with a few lighthearted remarks about the traffic.
Similarcomment, observation, aside, statement
- 2A comment, spoken or written, that calls attention to something observed.
The audit closed with a brief remark on several missing receipts.
His remarks about the painting's odd lighting drew everyone's attention to it.
Similarcomment, observation, mention, note
Note
Here the noticing has been put into words, and the verbs it takes show it: you make a remark, or pass one. Adjectives set its tone, as in a biting remark or a funny remark. Unlike the casual comment, it can be deliberate and pointed, and its plural, remarks, readily names a whole short speech.
- 3To comment on something; to offer thoughts or observations about it in speech or writing.
Several critics remarked on the film's unusual pacing.
Economists remark on the quarterly figures without ever agreeing on their meaning.
Similarcomment
- 4To express something in speech or writing; to state it as an observation.
She remarked that the new schedule seemed rushed.
Visitors to the museum frequently remark how lifelike the statues appear.
Similarobserve, comment, note, mention, say
Note
The reporting verb of the family, and it takes a clause: he remarked that it was getting late. In narrative the participle often trails the main sentence, as in "…which caused me to smile, remarking that I had noticed…" Chosen over said, it frames the words as an observation rather than a claim or a command.
- 5The act of noticing or pointing something out; notice or observation.
The senator's absence from the vote did not escape remark.
Such an unusual fossil is worthy of remark in any survey of the site.
Similarnotice, comment, attention, mention
Note
The noun from which this family of senses grows. It comes from French remarquer, built from re- "again" and marquer "to mark", the image of marking something a second time. Used without an article, it survives in phrases like worth remark and worthy of remark, where it means notice itself rather than any spoken comment. A thing that escapes remark has gone unnoticed, not merely unmentioned.
- 6To take notice of something; to perceive or pay heed to it.
Careful readers remark the shift in tone halfway through the chapter.
He remarked a faint smell of smoke before anyone else did.
Similarnotice, observe, note, perceive, detect
Note
A literary sense that is easy to misread. When Robert Louis Stevenson's character asks "Did you ever remark that door?" in Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886), he means "notice," not "say something about." John le Carré still uses it in 1986, with heads turning and remarking a display of feeling. When a direct object follows and nothing is spoken, read it as perceive. When a that-clause follows, it is the speaking sense.
- 7Alternative form of remarque.
Early proofs of the etching include a remark of a sailboat in the lower margin.
The engraver added a small remark beside his signature on each plate.
Note
An engraver's word, and here an English spelling of the French remarque. It names a small design etched in the margin of a plate and meant to be removed once the earliest proofs were taken. By extension it covers any feature marking a stage of the plate, or a print that carries such a mark. Collectors more often write remarque, which also keeps it clear of the everyday comment.
- 8USree-MAHRK/ˌɹiˈmɑɹk/UKree-MAHK/ˌɹiːˈmɑːk/Alternative spelling of re-mark.
The student requested a remark after receiving a failing grade.
A full remark of the inventory labels was scheduled for the weekend.
Note
A homograph with its own origin. This word is simply re- added to mark in English, while the noun for a comment came through French remarquer. Here it means a mark that replaces another, as when an exam is graded afresh. Because the solid spelling looks exactly like the noun for a comment, the hyphenated re-mark is the safer choice whenever context leaves any doubt.
- 9USree-MAHRK/ˌɹiˈmɑɹk/UKree-MAHK/ˌɹiːˈmɑːk/Alternative spelling of re-mark.
The professor offered to remark the exams after the grading error came to light.
Crews had to remark the trail after the storm washed the paint away.
Note
The verb "to mark again" shares the English-built origin of the replacement-mark noun. Its forms collide with the commenting verb at every point: remarks, remarking and remarked are spelled identically. So "she remarked the papers" is ambiguous on the page. It could mean she graded them again or that she noticed them. Writing re-mark, re-marked and re-marking removes the doubt.
Less common meanings
- 10To draw attention to something, either by indicating it or by commenting on it.
Note
A construction English has dropped. In Amelia Opie's Dangers of Coquetry (1790), a character opens a conversation by remarking the warmth of the room, with the thing commented on as a direct object. Modern English adds a preposition, as in the "comment on" construction. Without the on, a present-day reader will hear "noticed the warmth" instead.
- 11To give someone or something a quality that makes them stand out from others.
Her wit and learning remarked her among the ladies of the court.
His manacles remark him; there he sits.
1671, John Milton, “Samson Agonistes,”Note
This obsolete sense stays closest to mark itself. Milton's Samson Agonistes (1671) has "His manacles remark him; there he sits," meaning the chains single him out for every eye. The story of the root belongs to the noun of noticing. Here the marking is still physically on the person. Enjoy it in older verse, but do not revive it, because modern readers will hear "notice" or "comment."
Showing meanings only.
Practice
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Origins
From Middle French remarquer, from Old French remarquer, formed from re- ("again") plus marquer ("to mark").
Formed from the prefix re- combined with mark.