Example: Much of it has been horrific for the people of Russia, and benign for the rest of the world.
1. Benign [bih-nahyn]
Adjective: having a kindly disposition; gracious; a benign smile; favorable; propitious.
Synonyms: benevolent, favorable, friendly, gentle, mild, benignant, amiable, beneficent, complaisant, congenial, generous, genial, good, goodhearted, gracious, kind, liberal, merciful.
Antonyms: harsh, rough, unfriendly, unkind.
Example: Public recollection on the centenary has been scanty in India thus far, perhaps out of the fear that remembering the Russian Revolution is tantamount to endorsing its outcomes.
2. Recollection [rek-uh-lek-shuh n]
Noun: the act or power of recollecting, or recalling to mind; remembrance; something that is recollected.
Synonyms: memory, reminiscence, recall, retrospection.
3. Centenary [sen-ten-uh-ree, sen-tn-er-ee; especially British sen-tee-nuh-ree]
Adjective: of or relating to a period of 100 years; recurring once in every 100 years.
Noun: a centennial; a period of 100 years; century.
Synonyms: centennial, century, hundredth, centuplicate.
4. Scanty [skan-tee]
Adjective: scant in amount, quantity, etc.; barely sufficient; meager; not adequate; lacking amplitude in extent or compass.
Synonyms: insufficient, meager, scant, skimpy, sparse, close, failing, limited, little, narrow, poor, short, shy, spare, bare, barely sufficient, deficient, exiguous, minimal, rare, restricted, scrimpy, slender, sparing.
Antonyms: adequate, enough, full, sufficient.
5. Tantamount [tan-tuh-mount]
Adjective: equivalent, as in value, force, effect, or signification.
Synonyms: commensurate, identical, alike, as good as, duplicate, equal, equivalent, indistinguishable, like, parallel, same as, selfsame, synonymous, uniform, very.
Antonyms: different, opposite, polar, reverse.
6. Endorse [en-dawrs]
Verb: to approve, support, or sustain; to designate oneself as payee of (a check) by signing, usually on the reverse side of the instrument; to sign one’s name on (a commercial document or other instrument).
Synonyms: advocate, affirm, approve, back, commend, confirm, defend, favor, okay, praise, ratify, recommend, sanction, uphold, accredit, attest, authenticate, bless, boost, certify, champion, countenance, guarantee, push, second, sustain, underwrite, warrant.
Antonyms: attack, censure, criticize, deny.
Example: There is no gainsaying that the revolution in Russia was momentous.
7. Gainsay [geyn-sey, geyn-sey]
Verb: to deny, dispute, or contradict; to speak or act against; oppose.
Synonyms: combat, contravene, controvert, cross, deny, disagree, disclaim, disprove, dispute, fight, impugn, negate, negative, oppose, refute, repudiate.
Antonyms: accept, acknowledge, admit, agree.
8. Momentous [moh-men-tuh s]
Adjective: of great or far-reaching importance or consequence.
Synonyms: consequential, crucial, decisive, eventful, far-reaching, fateful, historic, meaningful, memorable, notable, pivotal, significant, weighty, big, chips are down, considerable, critical, earth-shaking.
Antonyms: inconsequential, insignificant, meaningless, ordinary.
Example: After a brief interregnum of endless possibilities in the early 1920s, the vacuum created by the death of Lenin was taken advantage of by Josef Stalin to assume power.
9. Interregnum [in-ter-reg-nuh m]
Noun: an interval of time between the close of a sovereign’s reign and the accession of his or her normal or legitimate successor; any period during which a state has no ruler or only a temporary executive; any period of freedom from the usual authority.
Synonyms: meantime, breach, break, breather, cutoff, downtime, gap, hiatus, interlude, interruption, lacuna, layoff, letup, meanwhile, pause, time.
Antonyms: continuation, continuity, permanence.
Example: The opposition was annihilated, labour camps for dissidents established, the free press disbanded and the peasantry dispossessed.
10. Annihilate [uh-nahy-uh-leyt]
Verb: to reduce to utter ruin or nonexistence; destroy utterly; to destroy the collective existence or main body of; wipe out; to annul; make void.
Synonyms: crush, decimate, demolish, eradicate, exterminate, extinguish, finish off, liquidate, negate, obliterate, quell, raze, wipe out, abate, abolish, abrogate, annul, erase, expunge, extirpate, invalidate, massacre, murder, nullify, quash, ruin.
Antonyms: bear, build, construct, create.