Sunday Word: Equipoise
equipoise [ee-kwuh-poiz, ek-wuh-]
noun:
1 a state of equilibrium
2 counterbalance
Examples:
One reason for the endurance of George Stevens’s film, from 1953, is the supreme equipoise that it finds between two contending impulses - the will to wander, moving restlessly through a desert land, versus the urge to take root, battling for your right to settle down and defying those who would snatch it away. (Anthony Lane, Tough Girls, The New Yorker, January 2016)
LinkedIn has turned into the place you go to for the best of all possible worlds, where corporate vision, whole hearts, great work and a fulfilled life coexist in perfect equipoise, with good times and teamwork leading to virtuous riches and success for all. (Lucinda Holdforth, ‘A lot of nonsense’: It’s time to call out LinkedIn, The Sydney Morning Herald, July 2023)
Faye rarely looks inward; those books exude a kind of chilly spiritual equipoise. (Helen Shaw, Rachel Cusk and the Claustrophobia of Second Place, Vulture, April 2021)
Gradually, however, the conviction came upon me that I could, by a certain concentration of thought, think the veil away, and so get a glimpse of the mysterious face - as to which the two questions, "is she pretty?" and "is she plain?", still hung suspended, in my mind, in beautiful equipoise. (Lewis Carroll, Sylvie and Bruno)
Origin:
From Latin aequi- (equal) + Old French pois (weight), from Latin pendere (to weigh). Ultimately from the Indo-European root (s)pen- (to draw, to spin) (Wordsmith)