Would you use the word "revert" like this?

"I have just returned from some leave and will revert to you in the next two days with a response."

I found that an odd use of the word, though it was written to me in an email by an academic in Ireland. Perhaps you use the word "revert" differently in the UK/Ireland?

I thought "revert" meant to return to a former way of doing things. You hear of people reverting to their former habits if they've lapsed back into drinking or smoking after they have quit for a time. I have never heard it to mean "respond to your message."

Wordmatic

It's not a meaning recorded in the OED1. I suppose, the person means facetiously-etymologically "to get back to you" / "to turn back".

It's not a usage I've ever encountered.

I have come across it a couple of times in rather old-fashioned business letters. As zmj, suggests, it carries the meaning "get back to you".

I did understand what she had meant. However, it isn't a way I'd use the word. Shu was more direct; he said she used the word wrong.

I suspect she didn't use it facetiously because this was strictly business.

he said she used the word wrong

Many people use language in a weirdly manner.

I don't think of the use as 'wrong'. As I said, I've seen it before, and it is the the sort of phrasing used in old-fashioned business letters - you may know the sort, although perhaps it was more common over here. An example would be:

Your esteemed communication of the 16th ultimo is to hand. We will investigate this matter and revert to you with the results of our investigations by the 16th proximo.

I remain, Sir, your faithful servant,

This is the style of writing that Sir Ernest Gowers fought against in his Plain Words books.

Dictionary.com definition 4. 'to go back in thought or discussion' does seem to fit this usage, even though it's a tight squeeze.

of the 16th ultimo

WC Fields used this style facetiously in his letters to friends and family. Ultimo, instant, and proximo for last, present, and next month. When clerks wore those little protectors over their white shirt sleeves and recorded figures in those huge ledgers.

don't forget the little visor..


edit: removed image

This message has been edited. Last edited by: tsuwm,

Green eyeshades (link) and sleeve protectors. Though I did find a great word not in Onelook, scogger (link).

(tsuwm, your image link is broken.)

The image link works OK for me.

Well, it was broken. After I right-clicked on it to view image, it popped into place. Go figure. Gremlins in the bit bucket.

>broken link

I had to do the same thing with IE7, jim.

IE7

Weird. I'm using FF2.

It won't appear in Opera, either. Even right-clicking > View Image does nothing. I tried with FF2 and it just showed the 'broken' icon at first, but it appeared after chosing View Image, as it did for zm.

EDIT: It's magically now appeared in Opera now, after posing this!

as long as we're fixating on that image, I may as well ask..

1) is there a better way to post a piccy here, other than just ramming one in from the source via the <img> markup as I did there?

b) it's a pretty big 'un; should I have reduced it some?

Þ) or, are pictures better left unsaid here, and just linked to perhaps?

Yes, good netiquette is not to steal bandwidth from the site you got the picture from, but to upload to your own server (or upload it to Flikr or Picasa) and link to that. I think they are doing something at their end to discourage the practice, but now that I directly viewed it, it's cached on my machine and so it's viewable. I once found that many hits I was getting to my blog was actually somebody including a link to an image on their MySpace home page.

If I may revert to the word at hand, I thunk it meant "to turn green again" from the French, vert, "green."