Phrases like "put out" or "off colour" might have been coined by Mr. Henry James in an agony of verbal precision.

If Spock felt any physical discomfort in the autopsy room, it was well masked, but he was definitely pained by Frazer's lack of verbal precision.

It would be reasonable to call such a competition an "open tournament," but few sponsors make the effort to reach this level of verbal precision.

Increasingly comfortable as his spokeswoman, she is appearing more often in public, where her verbal precision is a sharp counterpoint to Mr. Bush's own tendency to speak in vague and sometimes confusing colloquialisms.

However, at this early stage of his career, his writing was not yet remarkable for its subtlety, verbal precision and variety of effects.

The portrait of the composer that emerges is of a scrupulous miniaturist whose music expertly treads the line between contemporary pop and traditional theatrical modes and who wields an impressive verbal precision.

Mr. Pizzarelli is a great comic storyteller and mimic whose verbal precision almost matches his dexterity as a high-speed finger-picker who scats in unison with his guitar solos.

For alertness is godliness, and note-taking is alertness's method, and verbal precision is alertness's sign.

With our sense of language dulled, who can appreciate the exquisite verbal precision of the very finest literature?

Sheridan, in contrast, was writing a social comedy rooted in 18th-century manners and delighting in verbal precision.