speechify

From speech +‎ -ify.

• IPA^(key): /ˈspiːtʃɪfaɪ/

speechify (third-person singular simple present speechifies, present participle speechifying, simple past and past participle speechified) (obsolete or derisive)

1. (intransitive) To give a speech; to hold forth, to pronounce at length.
   • 1872, George Eliot [pseudonym; Mary Ann Evans], chapter LVI, in Middlemarch: A Study of Provincial Life, volume III, Edinburgh; London: William Blackwood and Sons, OCLC 948783829, book VI (The Widow and the Wife), page 238:

     Caleb was a powerful man and knew little of any fear except the fear of hurting others and the fear of having to speechify.

   • 1985, Lawrence Durrell, Quinx, Faber & Faber 2004 (Avignon Quintet), p. 1351:

     He never missed a chance of speechifying in public.

2. (transitive) To make speeches to (someone); to address in a speech.
   • 1864, Charles Dickens, "Mrs. Lirriper's Legacy," ch. 2:

     They take their little enjoyments on little means and with little things and don't let solemn big-wigs stare them out of countenance or speechify them dull.

• speechifying

• bespeech