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bookend en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• /ˈbɵkɛnd/ (British, Southern, Standard)
• /ˈbʉkɛnd/ (Northern-Ireland, Scotland)
• /ˈbʊkɛnd/ (General-American, Received-Pronunciation)
• /ˈbʊkend/ (Australia, New-Zealand)

Etymology

From book + end.

Meanings

1. A heavy object or moveable support placed at one or both ends of a row of books for the purpose of keeping them upright.
2. (figuratively) Something that comes before, after, or at both sides of something else.
   • In the factory, a colourful woodland of knitted trees points towards a collection of bookends commissioned from Scottish designers and inspired by the globetrotting travels in 1894 of Dundee Courier journalists Marie Imandt and Bessie Maxwell. 2024 September 21, Eve Livingston, “‘Students want to stay here now rather than disappear to London’: how design transformed the city of Dundee”, in The Guardian:
   • […] radio techniques, including the use of sound montage and the placement of musical "bookends" at the beginning and end of radio programs […] 2020, Joy Elizabeth Hayes, Radio Nation, page 20:
   • The cabinet minister's appearance served as something of a bookend to her grilling by the Home Affairs select committee in April this year[…] 2012 November 1, Kelly Fiveash, “Snooper's-charter plans are just misunderstood, sniffles tearful May”, in The Register:
   • And it seemed, perhaps fancifully, that those two moments had become the bookends of a generation and of a nation’s frayed sense of equilibrium. 2022 September 19, Alan Cowell, “From Coronation to Funeral: Bookends to the Life of a Queen, and a Generation”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, archived from the original on 02 Nov 2022:
   • In both Episode 1 and Episode 9, which serve as bookends, Burns found fascinating footage of a 1938 event at which President Franklin Roosevelt spoke to living veterans who wore the Blue and the Gray; […] 2017, Douglas Brode, Shea T. Brode, Cynthia J. Miller, The American Civil War on Film and TV, page 214:

Forms

Spelling	Features	Labels	Source
bookends	Number=Plur		lexicographic
book end		alternative	lexicographic
book-end		alternative	lexicographic

Synonyms

book support

Translations (20)

cmn 書擋 /书挡 (object designed to keep books upright) · is bókastoð (object designed to keep books upright) · es sujetalibros (object designed to keep books upright) · ru подпо́рка для книг (object designed to keep books upright) · fr serre-livre (object designed to keep books upright) · no bokstøtte (object designed to keep books upright) · pt bibliocanto (object designed to keep books upright) · ko 북엔드 (object designed to keep books upright) · cy pentan llyfrau (object designed to keep books upright) · eo libroapogilo (object designed to keep books upright) · de Buchstütze (object designed to keep books upright) · ru книгодержа́тель (object designed to keep books upright) · it reggilibro (object designed to keep books upright) · nl boekensteun (object designed to keep books upright) · ja ブックエンド (object designed to keep books upright) · ja 本立て (object designed to keep books upright) · sv bokstöd (object designed to keep books upright) · da bogstøtte (object designed to keep books upright) · ca aguantallibres (object designed to keep books upright) · fi kirjatuki (object designed to keep books upright)

bookend en · VERB

Pronunciation

• /ˈbɵkɛnd/ (British, Southern, Standard)
• /ˈbʉkɛnd/ (Northern-Ireland, Scotland)
• /ˈbʊkɛnd/ (General-American, Received-Pronunciation)
• /ˈbʊkend/ (Australia, New-Zealand)

Etymology

From book + end.

Meanings

1. (figuratively, often, transitive) To come before and after, or at both sides of.
   • The tale is bookended by battles – faces meatily pummelled, bones crunchily broken and throats spurtingly sliced as offstage conflicts are placed centre-screen. 2015 October 4, Mark Kermode, “Macbeth review – a spittle-flecked Shakespearean war film”, in The Observer:
   • Taking the 18th-century tale at a steady, relentless drumbeat, and with a seductively cool detachment, Kubrick guides you through his hero’s rise and fall, bookended by two sensational duelling scenes. 2016 July 28, Peter Bradshaw, “Barry Lyndon review – Kubrick's intimate epic of utter lucidity”, in The Guardian, →ISSN:
   • Her aim is to answer questions that “raze to the bone of life”, including the most profound of all: “How, in this blink of existence bookended by nothingness, do we attain completeness of being?” 2020 February 7, P. D. Smith, quoting Maria Popova, “Figuring by Maria Popova review – distillation of a lifetime's reading”, in The Guardian, →ISSN:
   • Side one has good songs bookended by better songs. 2006, Henry Owings, Patton Oswalt, The Overrated Book, →ISBN, page 105:
   • Yes, there are leisure lines to be enjoyed - in the Welsh 'Queen' resorts of Llandudno and Aberystwyth, or the steamer jewel of Douglas on the Isle of Man, where dramatic mountain and hill inclines were overcome and bookended with amusements and culinary amenities for the enjoyment of visitors. 2021 February 10, Dr Joseph Brennan, “Versatile and functional funiculars”, in RAIL, number 924, page 61:

Forms

Spelling	Features	Labels	Source
bookended	Tense=Past, VerbForm=Part		lexicographic
bookended	Tense=Past		lexicographic
bookending	Tense=Pres, VerbForm=Part		lexicographic
bookends	Number=Sing, Person=3, Tense=Pres		lexicographic

Synonyms

flank

Translations (2)

de einrahmen (to come before and after, or at both sides of) · hu közrefog (to come before and after, or at both sides of)