(Don't act pompous or cocky, though).
Any subtlety that might be found in these early works (including "The Inspector General" and "The Bear") — which mostly have to do with pompous or pathetic bureaucrats, landowners, peasants, and artists and their fickle women — is lost amid the company's polished but mediocre clowning.
Somehow, Pierce and his band did, avoiding the pompous while achieving a whole lot of big.
And he did not sound pompous, even though there are simpler ways to say that politicians should avoid doing things that look bad.
Rushdie admitted: "I did call him a pompous ass, which I thought pretty mild".
Sometimes rattled and breaking into perspiration, a vein throbbing in his right temple, Mr. Breivik characterized some of his previous remarks as pompous but did not apologize or show remorse.
So, too -- with the help of some rubber on his scalp and jowls, some cushioning under his belt, some phlegm caught perpetually in his throat and makeup so thick that he carried a portable fan to keep it from melting -- did Mr. Plummer capture Bailey: pompous, swaggering, full of lawyerly machismo, an aging advocate struggling to remain relevant.
It does not sound pompous.
"The worst thing you can do is this pompous and long-winded announcement that new music is coming," he suggests.
· Am I alone (no, I know I'm not, for others have emailed, but I do love that pompous old formulation) in noticing that the year now in progress has been designated Twenty-O-Five?
