curtain-raise

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English

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Etymology

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From curtain-raiser.

Verb

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curtain-raise (third-person singular simple present curtain-raises, present participle curtain-raising, simple past and past participle curtain-raised)

  1. (transitive) To introduce; to prefigure, to set the stage for.
    • 1965, Herbert David Croly, The New Republic, volume 153:
      The fall and humiliation of Algerian President Ahmed ben Bella were carefully timed to curtain-raise what Bella intended as his biggest show, the "Second Bandung Conference."
    • 2010 Mar, Christopher Hitchens, “The Men Who Made England”, in The Atlantic:
      Curtain-raised here, also, is Cromwell's eventual readiness to smash the monasteries and confiscate their revenue and property to finance the building of a modern state []

Anagrams

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