Conundrum vs Contrive - What's the difference?
conundrum | contrive |
A difficult question or riddle, especially one using a play on words in the answer.
* 1816 ,
A difficult choice or decision that must be made.
* 2004 , ,
To form by an exercise of ingenuity; to devise; to plan; to scheme; to plot.
* Hawthorne
* 1813 , Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice , Modern Library Edition (1995), page 154
* {{quote-book, year=1963, author=(Margery Allingham), title=(The China Governess)
, chapter=10 To invent, to make devices; to form designs especially by improvisation.
To project, cast, or set forth, as in a projection of light.
As a noun conundrum
is a difficult question or riddle, especially one using a play on words in the answer.As a verb contrive is
to form by an exercise of ingenuity; to devise; to plan; to scheme; to plot.conundrum
English
Noun
(en-noun)- “Why should I understand that, or anything else?” asked the girl. “Don’t bother my head by asking conundrums , I beg of you. Just let me discover myself in my own way.”
statement read before being sentenced to five months in prison
- And while I am more concerned about the well-being of others than for myself, more hurt for them and for their losses than for my own, more worried for their futures than for the future of Martha Stewart the person, you are faced with a conundrum , a problem of monumental, to me, proportions.
Quotations
* (English Citations of "conundrum")Synonyms
* (difficult question) brain-teaser, enigma, puzzle, riddle * (difficult choice) dilemmacontrive
English
Verb
(contriv)- Neither do thou imagine that I shall contrive aught against his life.
- I cannot bear the idea of two young women traveling post by themselves. It is highly improper. You must contrive to send somebody.
citation, passage=With a little manœuvring they contrived to meet on the doorstep which was […] in a boiling stream of passers-by, hurrying business people speeding past in a flurry of fumes and dust in the bright haze.}}