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3465 25th Street, Suite 17
San Francisco, CA 94110 | (noun)
[POEL-tahr-giest'] 
1. a ghost that reveals its presence by creating disturbances, as by rapping or knocking over objects: "A poltergeist had clearly infiltrated our household, and was squirreling away various personal effects, starting with my sunglasses and most recently extending to my cell phone."
Origin:
Approximately 1848; borrowed from German, 'Poltergeist' ('poltern': to make noises, to rattle + 'Geist': ghost, spirit). In action:
"The malevolent warlock He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named lives inside of Jim Dale.
So does the jittery house-elf Dobby, the gentle half-giant Hagrid, the sputtering poltergeist Peeves, Hermione the prim pupil -- and, of course, Harry Potter, the boy wizard.
Dale, 67, is the lone narrator behind the audiobook versions of J.K. Rowling's 'Harry Potter' novels, having created scores of voices during the hundreds of hours spent recording the five books.
In the latest installment, 'Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix,' Dale breathed life into 134 different characters, creatures and critters -- delivering a nearly 26-hour one-man show."
Anthony Breznican. "134 'Potter' characters, 1 actor -- now that's magic!" The Associated Press (July 6, 2003).
"Franklin Fay Birkinshaw Davies Bateman Weldon Fox -- for such are the sequential selves she acknowledges -- says of herself, 'I do what is under my nose to be done, without too much lamentation,' and her autobiography, 'Auto da Fay,' bears her out. She is inclined simply to get on with things and also to make pronouncements in a no-nonsense mode: 'Very few people are interested in the truth'; 'The prophets of doom . . . are generally ignored and usually right.' She's also fond of generalizing from a perspective at times pious ('Many good things come out of sacrifice'), feminist ('There is a certain kind of professor, often in the sciences, who seems to keep a wife only to insult her') and self-deprecating ('There is always someone else round the corner doing it better, charging less and cornering the market').
In paradoxical parallel to this pragmatic streak runs a family interest in the occult, which no doubt also feeds the fictional wellspring. Weldon's mother had a 'gift for prophecy'; her maternal grandfather was a member, along with W. B. Yeats, of the secret cabalistic Order of the Golden Dawn; and she herself assumes 'telepathy between members of a family,' periodically protesting disbelief in ghosts even as she contemplates another poltergeist or a sobbing presence on the far side of the door."
Janet Burroway. "'Auto da Fay': Portrait of the Author as a Young Woman," [Book Review: 'AUTO DA FAY' by Fay Weldon] The New York Times (June 29, 2003).
"The last person in there before me, the terrorist I am seeking who I've nicknamed 'Logleaver' had left that toilet so plugged the only direction it could flush ... was up.
No, you couldn't see the offending blockage, but that's what made it so lethal.
We're talking poltergeist activity here. That spewing toilet became the outlet for Satan's sewer. You wouldn't have believed what came at me, as I turned and in super-slo-mo, ran for the door, chased by a tsunami of human offal. I swear I heard Vincent Price's evil, gloating laugh echoing off the tiles."
Laurie Mustard. "Columnist gets his comeuppance: It hit the fan, and the stairs, and the . . ." The Winnipeg Sun (July 6, 2003).
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