writing

American  

[rahy-ting] / ˈraɪ tɪŋ /

noun

1. the act of a person or thing that writes.

2. written written form.

   to commit one's thoughts to writing.

3. that which is written; written; characters or matter written written with a pen or the like.

   His writing is illegible.

4. such characters or matter with respect to style, kind, quality, etc.

5. an inscription.

6. a letter.

7. any written written or printed paper, as a document or deed.

8. literary or musical style, form, quality, technique, etc..

   Her writing is stilted.

9. a literary composition or production.

10. the profession of a writer.

    He turned to writing at an early age.

11. the Writings, Hagiographa.

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idioms

1. writing on the wall. handwriting.

writing British  

/ ˈraɪtɪŋ /

noun

1. a group of letters or symbols written or marked on a surface as a means of communicating ideas by making each symbol stand for an idea, concept, or thing, by using each symbol to represent a set of sounds grouped into syllables ( syllabic writing ), or by regarding each symbol as corresponding roughly or exactly to each of the sounds in the language ( alphabetic writing ) See also ideogram

2. short for handwriting

3. anything expressed in letters, esp a literary composition

4. the work of a writer

5. literary style, art, or practice

6. written form

   give it to me in writing

7. (modifier) related to or used in writing

   writing ink

8. a sign or signs of approaching disaster

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Other Word Forms

• self-writing adjective
• unwriting adjective

Etymology

Origin of writing

First recorded in 1175–1225; Middle English; write + -ing ¹

Example Sentences

Museveni had said, in a 1986 collection of writing: "The problem of Africa in general, and Uganda in particular, is not the people but leaders who want to overstay in power."

From BBC

Ives is upbeat about Apple’s traction with the iPhone 17, writing Sunday that it has room to “handily exceed current Street estimates” this year.

From MarketWatch

Williams is now about six months into various projects that have involved watching video clips and writing out captions of everything that’s happening in them, and rating the quality of videos generated by prompts.

From The Wall Street Journal

I also get compliments and requests for writing sophisticated and ground-breaking papers on blood disorders.

From The Wall Street Journal

Others have focused attention on the distance between these contemplative writings and the facts of Marcus’ political career.

From The Wall Street Journal

Related Words

• article
• book
• document
• essay
• letter
• literature
• manuscript
• novel
• paper
• piece
• poem
• prose
• publication
• review
• theme
• work