Several are told in such an elliptical manner that their characters seem unmoored from motivation.

His elliptical, philosophical manner of conversation reflects his work, which finds expansive possibilities in the most ordinary things, drawing on materials of every variety, including wire, matches, plain bond paper and other throwaway items.

In one sense this is an art-world in joke (the Starns are the new sensations of art photography), but the image also speaks seriously, in Wegman's typical elliptical manner, about competition, fame and the fate of artists who grow older.

Moses tries in a gently elliptical manner to explain to Aaron that the latter's death is at hand, asking hypothetically whether Aaron was loaned something from God which God might now want returned; however, Aaron does not perceive Moses's meaning.

So, one more in an elliptical manner, Moses requests that Aaron leave the vestments with Eleazar outside the cave because they might otherwise become defiled in the cave (where there may be graves, Moses points out).

It is shaped in an elliptical manner.

Among the best, Janice Tanaka's "Memories From the Department of Amnesia" also happens to explore Japanese-American identity, but in a more elliptical manner that complements "History and Memory."

About four to ten rivets are arranged in a roughly elliptical manner.

Mr. Freeling, a quicksilver stylist, writes in an elliptical, free-form manner that gives his brainy hero the freedom to skim over procedural details and fly off on more interesting philosophical tangents.

"If you choose to speak in a less elliptical manner, aye."