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  • The German equivalent of the French (and now English) esprit de l'escalier (literally, "spirit of the staircase"). Discussed in Howard Rheingold's They Have a Word for It, where both terms are defined as a "clever remark that comes to mind when it is too late to utter it." Other coinages for this concept include retrotort and stairwit.

    October 11, 2011

  • For more discussion, see l'esprit de l'escalier.

    October 11, 2011