What example would you give of audacity?

No, if you post in W&W they will have the audacity to give you fifteen links to the dictionary.com definition of audacity. Not that I'm feeling terribly inspired myself, but I'll give it a shot.

There's the guy who called the cops on his friend who had stolen his pot. Stupid fits there too.

I once had a job that neglected to pay me for ten hours of overtime and while I was fighting for it my boss had the nerve to ask me to stay late. That pretty well frosted my cookies.

For literary audacity look no further than the Stamper clan in Sometimes A Great Notion. Hank ran his family lumber operation in the face of a company town, out on strike. Meanwhile his little brother, Lee, was deliberately trying to steal Hank's wife, right out from under his nose, as revenge for Hank's having slept with his mother. Don't even get me started on old Henry . . .

Or, how about Scarlett O'Hara? Doesn't she pretty much define the term? All those expedient husbands, stolen from sisters and friends, among other things.

Ignatius J. Reilly, from A Confederacy Of Dunces, is pretty much an audacious all-rounder himself. I could spend all night citing examples, but if you've read the book you know what I mean, and if you haven't, well, you should.

Siegfried Farnon, from James Herriot's All Creatures Great and Small, is another generally audacious character. He was Jim's boss and was always telling him to do one thing and then making a fool of him in public by doing the exact opposite of what he had said in the first place, loudly berating Jim all the while.

I thought of citing Steinbeck's Cannery Row, where the boys throw a party in Doc's honor and manage to destroy his lab in the process, but they were so repentant that I'm not sure it qualifies.

What about Pip, from Great Expectations? Even though he learned his lessons in the end, he had a few pretty audacious periods, getting all uppitty with poor Joe and such.

Oh, geez, I almost forgot about Mildred, from Of Human Bondage. She makes Scarlett look like a saint!

Oh, there's more, I'll probably be back. I need some coffee.

Well, evidently I can't stop. Please let me know if I'm completely off-track with my examples.

***Edit) I'm nuts, and I have no life.

Confederacy is a great book, I'm pretty sure you'd love it.

Oooh, oooh, how about Richard Nixon and "I am not a crook", or "you won't have me to kick around anymore"? That struck me as pretty audacious and I was but a child at the time. Yeah, that Clinton line works too. I'd forgotten, mainly because I never cared if he kept his pecker in his pants or not, but still.

I think it might be better to post this in Words & Wordplay like you said. The only example I can come up with is a real life one.

For 9th/10th grades I was out of the US (in Yemen, actually). Before we left, I had to have my report cards translated into English so I could get into high school in MI once we got back. And that was fine. The problem was that they didn't correspond well to the credit/grade system here. The counselor did a horrible job (no exaggeration) with getting things to fit; where I had all As she gave me Bs, she mixed up course names and years, and I ended up having to repeat the same 10th grade algebra, chemistry, and physics in my last two years because they "didn't count."

I was just confused about the whole matter. The last time I went to talk to her and the principal about it, she had the audacity to tell me that the entire thing was my fault. And my dad's too. I was stunned. I have a messed up transcript to give to my university because of her and somehow I'm to blame.

She also had the audacity to ask me to give a speech at an event which was to be attended by the school board, about how great the school was and how much progress it was making (it was only three years old at the time). Admittedly, I was probably the only person who actually liked the school, but after that experience I was surprised she had the nerve to even consider asking me.

I wish I could give you an example from a book, though. All things considered, I'm not as well read as I should be.

I have a prime example: A few years ago, when my jealous boyfriend became incarcerated, he admitted to cheating on me with many women; married and single. I hung in there with him because I thought that he would have some time to think about how crazy he was for doing such a thing. As time went by, his jealousy got even worse and I just gave up and left him.

So about 1 1/2 year later, he gets out and plays the role that I like to call the VOY "victim of the year".....lol. I hear all the junk floating around about how awful I was for leaving him, but give me a break!!! We were in a 3 year relationship, we had 2 children, and he makes a fool out of me for that entire time but he has the audacity to pull that card because I left him while he was incarcerated.

Many years ago when I had been hired to run a sales organization of about 100 sales people, I had to meet with the board of directors on my second day. In that meeting I was asked what I thought I would accomplish in one year.

My response was: "We will dominate the industry in our product category." At that time the company had about 15% market share. The board members laughed. I did not. After one year the company had a 45% market share in the U.S.

The company was BSR, turntables (record players) was the product, and we accomplished the goal with very creative marketing.

My response to the board was audacious. Some thought egotistical, but when we finished the year, no one felt I had shown audacity. The year was 1972/73.

There's an old criminal defense lawyer in Atlanta named Herb Shafer. He don't break 5'8" would be my guess, but he stands tall in the courtroom and everywhere else where he rails against what he considers inappropriate conduct by prosecutors.

He doesn't possess much tolerance for legal shenanigans, especially when they originate with the State. One time, he took on the DAs office of a county far out on the southside with a blistering attack on its procedures.

At some point in his argument, he said they were all male poultry suckers.

I wish I had that kind of audacity.

I once managed a store and caught a 17 year old (underage) trying to steal a case of beer while taking out the evening's garbage. I fired him on the spot.

His response, "well since I lost my job, can I at least keep the beer to make it worth it".

I laughed. And took the beer back and fired his ***.

It was Schaefer. Of alll that beer he could attempt to steal, why Schaefer? I drink it at my local BBQ place because it's $2 a can (a can - who sells beer by the can today?) and goes well with ribs and pulled pork, but if you're gonna steal....

I'm stunned that the name Scaefer (Scafer) shows up again in this thread. Well, just goes to show that there's more then coincidnce going on here....

I don't have much to add, but this question was too good to let slip by.

I remember a certain famous man who was on trial for the brutal murders of his ex-wife and her acquaintance vowing to do everything in his power to find the REAL murderer. Sound familiar?

How about Drew Peterson, the policeman whose fourth wife went missing? Apparently his third wife died under rather strange circumstances. Depending on the truth behind what happened to the various wives, one could say there is a certain audacity.

reader mentioned Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind, and she is a good example. I would also mention Rhett Butler, who had his fair share of audacity.

I know I always go back to Pride and Prejudice, but the temerity of both Wickham and Lydia, when they come waltzing back to Longbourn after the scandal, knows no bounds. As Jane Austen says in P&P during this scene, "...but she sat down, resolving within herself to draw no limits in future to the impudence of an impudent man."

I know a personal one about a woman in the neighborhood who had given two ex-convicts a job when nobody else would. She was very good to them, and they repaid her by breaking into her home and using her own gun to kill her. Actually, this is worse than audacious, but temerity (or audacity) is one of the lesser words which could be applied to the situation.

Back to a book: isn't there a certain amount of audacity in what Miss Minchin does, turning Sara Crewe into a drudge after her father died in poverty in A Little Princess?

Becky Sharp from Vanity Fair was full of audacity. She basically stepped on anyone and everyone to get the wealth and status she wanted. She was a master of it.

How about the audacity of the murder in Murder on the Orient Express? Right under the nose, as it were, of the famous Belgian detective, Hercule Poirot, too.

The murderer in The Murder of Roger Ackroyd fits, too. He actually blames the victims for their murders. After all, they had done this and that so what else could he do? It was, in fact, the fault of the murdered.

The Scarlet Pimpernel exhibits a good form of audacity.

Sydney Carton's plan to save Charles Darnay in A Tale of Two Cities is audacious. (Some of the audacity you see is good, isn't it?)

Then again, all this might depend on what the definition of "is" is. :)

There are many books which could be named, but I can't compete with reader's list on this one. It's a great question!

***Edit: I just thought of another true "audacity story" which isn't the good kind. My brother was listening to CNN a few days after the election. They were talking to some people who had been among the early voters, asking about the wait times in some of those long lines. One man said he'd had to a wait in line for a long time. Then when he went to vote again, he had to wait a long time again. Each time he voted, he had to wait in a long line. The CNN reporter was stunned and told him he thought voting more than once was not legal. He didn't get any answer. I would call this audacity on the part of that particular voter.

Usain Bolt from Jamaica's Olympic track team who took the gold for the fastest human dash of something like 400meters and broke all standing records for human sprint speed...when he started beating his chest, looking at the crowd and basically celebrating his victory before he even actually crossed the finish line in 2008 summer games in China...cheers for him, but dang!

This is the second answer I am writing here, after deleting one already.

To me, in real life (since that is a part of the discussion here) politicians and lawyers are audacious. Often press and presidents are audacious people too. People full of audacity. Presidents who terrorise more than half the world, in an attempt to remove terrorism are "ironically audacious". Presidents who become one after spending years in exile on charges of corruption are "blatantly audacious". Then, there are those who are "audaciously audacious" - the people who claim to be national leaders and are yet against (and I mean against) almost half the people in that "nation". So those are three categories of audacious politicians - as I see them.

Then, turning to fiction (and not removing myself from reality) I find Charles Dickens (and writers like him) audacious. He was. Though historians today argue that Dickens was a hypocrite, as many other people in his social class, but that does not remove his fundamental principal. He was bold and he was daring too, though I wont call him impudent (at least not by his work). He had the guts to speak for the lowest social classes and not just dead work. He was largely responsibble for bringing out the realities of the bylanes of yesterday's London. As, a novelist that is a commendable job. Today, writers who write for truth are at once ostracised by the society - but Dickens has never gone out of print.

In fictious characters we must not forget the symbol of Boldness - Robin Hood. I wont elaborate on that.Though he was robber (and what a handsome one at that) but he was still audacious. More in action than orally.

I find the character of Uriah Heep audacious. This is an excellent piece of work. You will find such people at every corner and they demand a lot of caution.That "reptile" wormed (though David Copperfield may have liked to say 'writhed') his way into partnership of his benefactor, "the honorable Mr.Wickfield", and then even started dreaming of marrying his daughter and finally taking over the complete business. Vermin!

Another character, I will name is Bim from Clear Light of Day. Well this is audacity in a good way. Audacity in the simple meaning of "boldness". Alone, at a young age she decided to devote her life to her imbecile young brother and her education. This, after being orphaned by a careless set of parents, and an elder brother who thanklessly ran away and never turned back to check her. Thats an admirable boldness to stand up emotionally and personally erect and strong!

Does Amir from Kite Runner classify as bold? He rescued Sohrab friom the Taliban!

I think I am rambling. I must stop! Great question!

EDIT*** In connection with your example, there are people who were paid to relocate from a certain area in which they were residing, as residing there posed an environmental threat. They took the money and did not go. When the government came asking for reasons, they demanded more money to relocate, this despite using up the first paid money and accomodation.

TW K

where i come from we have a saying that says " he is a begger, and he wants the best"

i used to work in a restaurant (my uncles) and at the end of the day we would have lots of left overs. one day i decided to help the homeless so i told one to come at the end of the day to get some food. that person came and left, and over time he began to ask for things that were not offered (from the menu). then one day he showed up during lunch hour asking for a random item off the menu and to show my other customers that im generous i gave it to him but he refused it when he found out it has beans in it. then he just asked for a coke. i told him i offered you free food at the end of the day and now you want to take advantage. now he gets nothing.