embarrass

embarrass, discomfit, abash, disconcert, rattle, faze mean to balk by confusing or confounding, but each word is capable of expressing precise and distinctive shades of meaning.

Embarrass characteristically implies some influence which impedes freedom of thought, speech, or action and may be used with reference not only to persons but also to the things they plan or desire to do

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a course of legislation . . . which . . . embarrassed all transactions between individuals, by dispensing with a faithful performance of engagements— John Marshall

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When said of persons it commonly implies and often stresses resulting uneasiness or constraint

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he had, he knew, a sort of charm—it embarrassed him even to admit it— Mary Austin

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I was upset . . . and embarrassed by the crude and childish manner in which the townspeople were reduced to caricatures— J. M. Brown

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Discomfit in this sense typically retains some of its basic denotation of to put to rout; in such use it implies opposition and the competence with which one opponent routs the other and crushes his self-esteem or self-complacency

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an answer that completely discomfited the brash young man

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or throws him into confusion

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Bradley's polemical irony and his obvious zest in using it, his habit of discomfiting an opponent with a sudden profession of ignorance, of inability to understand, or of incapacity for abstruse thought— T. S. Eliot

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the Prime Minister began badly. Discomfited by Labor heckling from the front bench opposite, Eden lost his usual urbanity— Time

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or, sometimes, thwarts his wishes, his hopes, or his plans

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thieves discomfited by a wakeful dog

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he practiced the Socratic method . . . and earned among generations of discomfited students the designation Stinker Taussig— Lovett

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At times discomfit is used with much weakened force and then loses its suggestion of active opponency and implies no more than to make uncomfortable or embarrass

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it is discomfiting to recall the high hopes with which the states that had joined hands to defeat Fascism founded the United Nations— Sat. Review

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he drew discomfited chuckles from them in response to his garish laughter— Straight

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she may heckle the dealer, add a running commentary to the demonstrations, or just assume a discomfiting smugness— Fortune

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Abash presupposes self-confidence or self-possession and implies a usually sudden check to that mood by some influence that awakens shyness or a conviction of error or inferiority or, sometimes, of shame

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a man whom no denial, no scorn could abash— Fielding

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abashed by the base motives she found herself attributing to Charlotte— Wharton

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Disconcert, like embarrass, may be used in reference to actions and plans, but it is more frequently referred to persons. In either case it implies an upsetting or derangement; in the latter it suggests temporary loss of equanimity or of assurance

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when she saw him there came that flicker of fun into her eyes that was so disconcerting to Mr. Ezra— Deland

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Rattle more than disconcert stresses the emotional agitation accompanying the upset and implies a more complete disorganization of one's mental processes

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the jeering rattled the team and caused them to play badly

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rattled by hypothetical eyes spying on her— Stafford

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Faze is found chiefly in negative expressions, where it comes close to disconcert but sometimes carries the implications of abash and rattle

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neither rebuffs nor threats faze him in the least

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it hit Marciano flush on the right side of the jaw, but it didn't seem to faze him a bit— Liebling

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Analogous words: *discompose, disturb, perturb, fluster, flurry: bewilder, nonplus, perplex (see PUZZLE): *trouble, distress: vex, *annoy, bother, irk: impede, obstruct, block, *hinder: *hamper, fetter, shackle, hog-tie

Antonyms: relieve: facilitate