bookend

[ book-end ]

noun

1. a support placed at the end of a row of books to hold them upright, usually used in pairs.
2. one of two things occurring or located at either end of something else:

   two events that served as bookends to my career.

verb (used with object)

1. to occur or be located at the beginning and end of:

   His term in office was bookended by crises.

Word History and Origins

Origin of bookend¹

First recorded in 1905–10; book + end ¹

Example Sentences

The view of the Alaska Range, the joyous feeling of wind on my cheeks, and a buoyant sensation of wild abandon are forever stitched in my memory as the perfect bookend to a perfect day in the park.

From Outside Online

Leno also appears locked in at left tackle, and Cosmi or Lucas could be the other bookend.

From Washington Post

In fact, her surveillance became the bookends to all of his appointments.

From Time

It served as an unsettling bookend to a college sports year that began last summer with the flap over Oklahoma State football coach Mike Gundy wearing a One America News T-shirt.

From Washington Post

What began in a church choir as a kindergartner now finds a cinematic bookend in Tran’s 30s, with a role and a prayer.

From Washington Post

Your death is a tragic bookend to a year touted as the “transgender tipping point.”

From The Daily Beast

These weeks, and especially fast days that bookend them, are about remembering the experience of loss.

From The Daily Beast

Farm kids are educated early about the events that bookend life.

From The Daily Beast

And it became a sort of bookend to my first experience with him.

From The Daily Beast

But 9/11 has defined our stubbornly nameless decade, along with the bookend election of Barack Obama.

From The Daily Beast

Before I could follow, Nan had dropped the bookend and flung herself into my arms.

From Project Gutenberg

She held a heavy bookend poised to strike at Ashe, who was in front of her, moving stealthily forward.

From Project Gutenberg