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Ersatz vs Original - What's the difference?

ersatz | original |

As adjectives the difference between ersatz and original

is that ersatz is made in imitation; artificial, especially of an inferior quality while original is relating to the origin or beginning; preceding all others.

As nouns the difference between ersatz and original

is that ersatz is something made in imitation; an effigy or substitute while original is an object or other creation (e.g. narrative work) from which all later copies and variations are derived.

ersatz

English

Adjective

(en adjective)
  • Made in imitation; artificial, especially of an inferior quality.
  • Back then, we could only get ersatz coffee.

    Synonyms

    * artificial, faux, imitation, knock off

    Quotations

    * 1923 , Arthur Michael Samuel, The Mancroft Essays'', ''Pinchbeck'', page 164 (possibly published before in ''The Saturday Review in 1917–1921): *: In these days of “rolled” gold, electro-plate, and undetectable pearls, it is curious that almost the only honest Ersatz material known to the goldsmith's art should be utterly forgotten. * 1929 , "Zeppelining," Time , 16 Sep., *: Ersatzgas'', ''Ersatzpfennige . Ersatz has become a brave word in Germany. As a substantive it means War Reparations. As part of compounded words it means substitute. * 2001 , The New Yorker , 15 Oct, *: The avant-garde's opposite number, in Greenberg's scheme, is kitsch, "ersatz culture"—art for capitalism's new man (who turns out to be no different from Fascism's or Communism's new man). * 2003 , The New Yorker , 17 & 24 Feb, *: The NATO visitors watched an ersatz eighteenth-century dance (complete with powdered wigs and simulated copulation) that might have been considered obscene had it not been so amusing. * 2004 , The New Yorker , 31 May, *: The crowd wandered out to a huge party on the ersatz city blocks of the Paramount lot.

    Noun

    (ersatzes)
  • Something made in imitation; an effigy or substitute.
  • (en)

    Synonyms

    * imitation, knock off

    original

    English

    Adjective

    (en adjective)
  • (label) Relating to the origin or beginning; preceding all others.
  • *{{quote-book, year=1944, author=(w)
  • , title= The Three Corpse Trick, chapter=5 , passage=The hovel stood in the centre of what had once been a vegetable garden, but was now a patch of rank weeds. Surrounding this, almost like a zareba, was an irregular ring of gorse and brambles, an unclaimed vestige of the original common.}}
  • (label) First in a series or copies/versions.
  • * {{quote-book, year=1963, author=(Margery Allingham)
  • , title=(The China Governess) , chapter=1 citation , passage=The original family who had begun to build a palace to rival Nonesuch had died out before they had put up little more than the gateway, […].}}
  • (label) Newly created.
  • (label) Fresh, different.
  • (label) Pioneering.
  • (label) Having as its origin.
  • Synonyms

    * (first in series ) initial * autograph * prototype

    Antonyms

    * copy * derivative * reproduction * simile

    Derived terms

    * originally * original sin

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • An object or other creation (e.g. narrative work) from which all later copies and variations are derived
  • This manuscript is the original
  • A person with a unique and interesting personality and/or creative talent
  • You’re an original
  • (archaic) An eccentric
  • Synonyms

    * autograph * prototype

    Antonyms

    * copy * remake * reproduction

    Statistics

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