bittersweet

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bittersweet

bittersweet, name for two unrelated plants, belonging to different families, both fall-fruiting woody vines sometimes cultivated for their decorative scarlet berries. One, called also woody nightshade (Solanum dulcamara), is an Old World plant now naturalized in North America, belonging to the family Solanaceae (nightshade family). The twigs and stems are occasionally used medicinally for a narcotic poison similar to belladonna. The more popular bittersweet (Celastrus scandens), a plant of the family Celastraceae (staff tree family), grows in thickets from Maine to North Carolina and W to Nebraska. Its berry is surrounded by an orange-yellow capsule. Both bittersweets are classified in the division Magnoliophyta, class Magnoliopsida. S. dulcamara belongs to the order Solanales, family Solanaceae. C. scandens belongs to the order Celastrales, family Celastraceae.

bittersweet

traditional symbol of truth. [Plant Symbolism: Flora Symbolica, 172]

See: Honesty

bittersweet

1. any of several North American woody climbing plants of the genus Celastrus, esp C. scandens, having orange capsules that open to expose scarlet-coated seeds: family Celastraceae

2. another name for woody nightshade

Collins Discovery Encyclopedia, 1st edition © HarperCollins Publishers 2005

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It bittersweetly acknowledges that the dreck of the mass cultural airwaves might, for many souls, constitute a kind of "halo," ennobling everyday life.

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But something goes awry when the Bleckneroid character shapes up as an evil foil to Benabib's bland, straight, earnest narrator, whose bittersweet coming of age this novel is meant to bittersweetly commemorate.

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And so it recently came to pass on the show that Bea finally made up her mind-and sadly, bittersweetly had to face up to her true feelings-and turned Xian down.