— wordily , adv. — wordiness , n.
/werr"dee/ , adj., wordier, wordiest .
1. characterized by or given to the use of many, or too many, words; verbose: She grew impatient at his wordy reply.
2. pertaining to or consisting of words; verbal.
[ bef. 1100; ME; OE wordig. See WORD, -Y 1 ]
Syn. 1. diffuse, talkative, loquacious, voluble. WORDY, PROLIX, REDUNDANT, PLEONASTIC all mean using more words than necessary to convey a desired meaning. WORDY, the broadest and least specific of these terms, may, in addition to indicating an excess of words, suggest a garrulousness or loquaciousness: a wordy, gossipy account of a simple incident. PROLIX refers to speech or writing extended to great and tedious length with inconsequential details: a prolix style that tells you more than you need or want to know.
REDUNDANT and PLEONASTIC both refer to unnecessary repetition of language. REDUNDANT has also a generalized sense of "excessive" or "no longer needed": the dismissal of redundant employees. In describing language, it most often refers to overelaboration through the use of expressions that repeat the sense of other expressions in a passage: a redundant text crammed with amplifications of the obvious. PLEONASTIC, usually a technical term, refers most often to expressions that repeat something that has been said before: "A true fact" and "a free gift" are pleonastic expressions.