aperçu

Borrowed from French aperçu.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˌa.pɛːˈsjuː/

aperçu (plural aperçus)

1. A clever insight.
   • 1988, Alan Hollinghurst, The Swimming Pool Library, Penguin Books, paperback edition, page 143

     I insisted on how his opinion mattered, and developed and construed his platitudes into aperçus he was far from entertaining himself.

   • 2001, David Brooks, "One Nation, Slightly Divisible", The Atlantic Monthly, December,

     In this place you can go to a year's worth of dinner parties without hearing anyone quote an aperçu he first heard on Charlie Rose.

   • 2004, Manohla Dargis, "Do You Hear Sleigh Bells? Nah, Just Tom Hanks and Some Train" (Polar Express movie review), New York Times, 10 November,

     "Every so often a hobo (Mr. Hanks again) materializes to dispense a cryptic aperçu to the boy, maybe because the child is the father of the man or because the film's envelope-pushing gobbled up most of the budget and there was only enough money for one star."

   • 2009, Maureen Dowd, "Dark Dark Dark" (Editorial), New York Times, 21 February,

     President Obama disdains sound bites, and he does not have Bill Clinton’s talent for reducing the abstruse to aperçus.

   • 2014 October 30, Ben Brantley, “When the head leads the heart: 'The Real Thing,' With Ewan McGregor and Maggie Gyllenhaal, opens on Broadway [print version: When the witty head is far ahead of the heart: Maggie Gyllenhaal and Ewan McGregor star in revival of 'Real Thing', International New York Times, 4 November 2014, p. 9]”, in The New York Times‎:

     While we know – because the script tells us so – that the people we are watching are in love and in pain and in trouble, they never come across as more than dispensers of sparkling aperçus.

2. A summary or outline; words that summarize.

• earcup

• IPA^(key): /apɛʁsy/

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aperçu m (plural aperçus)

1. glance, glimpse
2. insight, hint

   L’avocat a donné au public un aperçu de la cause.

   The lawyer gave the public an insight into the case.

3. rough estimate.

   Donnez-moi un aperçu des dépenses que j’aurai à faire.

   Give me an estimate of the expenses that I would have.

4. sketch, outline, summary
5. view
6. overview

   Ce que je vous dis là n’est qu’un aperçu de la question.

   What I say here is an overview of the issue.

7. preview

   Il y a dans cet ouvrage des aperçus très fins, mais rien n’est développé.

   There are fine previews in this book, but nothing developed.

aperçu m (feminine singular aperçue, masculine plural aperçus, feminine plural aperçues)

1. past participle of apercevoir

1. (nautical) aye, aye

• “aperçu” in le Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).