divertive

From the very beginning of the Irish National Dramatic Company, Mr. Yeats has been an advocate of scenery that is background chiefly, and in no way divertive of attention from the play itself, its thought, its words, its acting.

Irish Plays and Playwrights Cornelius Weygandt 1914

This shews some good will he has to the Comick Trade however; and I doubt not, but if his Closet were Ransack'd, we might find a divertive

Essays on the Stage Preface to the Campaigners (1689) and Preface to the Translation of Bossuet's Maxims and Reflections on Plays (1699) Thomas D'Urfey 1688

Audience laugh at his figure at the end of the Play, as well as they had at the beginning; but I believe if I had put an _Absolver_ upon his back, giving him a Blessing, it would have been more divertive by half; but let him alone, the next horrible Crime is, I meddle with Churchmen, and there my _malice makes me_, he says, _lay about me like a Knight

Essays on the Stage Preface to the Campaigners (1689) and Preface to the Translation of Bossuet's Maxims and Reflections on Plays (1699) Thomas D'Urfey 1688

Spend not too muchtf your precious time in divertive exercises and recreations.

Apocalyptical key. An extraordinary discourse on the rise and fall of papacy; or, The pouring out of the vials, in the Revelation of St. John, chap. XVI .. Fleming, Robert, 1660?-1716 1793

It’s not these divertive topics that are necessarily the problemwell, skip the latter, they can be excellent discussions, but where they are raised—on threads dealing with issues and their impact on women.

Alas, a Moderation Policy 2005