Definition of "extemporize"

extemporize

verb
third-person singular simple present extemporizes, present participle extemporizing, simple past and past participle extemporized
1. (intransitive) To perform or speak without prior planning or thought; to act in an impromptu manner; to improvise.
  Quotations
  "Will you please tell me whose music you have been playing?" . ."It's nobody's, miss.""Do you mean you have been extemporizing all this time?"
  1881, George MacDonald, chapter 35, in Mary Marston
  But while some of his predecessors liked to extemporize, Obama prefers the message to be just so.
  2009 March 5, Peter Baker, “The (very) scripted president”, in New York Times, retrieved 8 November 2011
2. (transitive) To adapt, improvise, or devise action or speech in an impromptu or spontaneous manner.
  Quotations
  As the music came fresher on their ears, they danced to its cadence, extemporizing new steps and attitudes.
  1860, Nathaniel Hawthorne, chapter 10, in The Marble Faun
  The small jelly-speck, which we call the amoeba, has no organs save what it can extemporize as occasion arises.
  1879, Samuel Butler, chapter 5, in Evolution, Old & New
  The wine runs into pitchers, washing-basins, shards, chamber- vessels, and other extemporized receptacles.
  1906, Thomas Hardy, The Dynasts, Part Second, Act Third
  His most famous words — "I have a dream" — were extemporized.
  2003 August 25, Emily Eakin, “How King Shaped The Dream”, in New York Times, retrieved 8 November 2011

Definition of "extemporize"

extemporize

verb

Quotations

Quotations