soberer

English

Etymology

From sober +‎ -er (comparative suffix) or +‎ -er (agent noun suffix).

Adjective

soberer

1. comparative form of sober: more sober

Noun

soberer (plural soberers)

1. Something that makes a person sober.
   • 1831, James Athearn Jones, chapter 7, in Haverhill; or, Memoirs of an Officer in the Army of Wolfe‎^[1], volume 3, London: T.&W. Boone, page 165:

     I was once very mischievous—I am not so now, age is a sad soberer of frolic fancies […]

   • 1901, R. B. Cunninghame Graham, chapter 10, in A Vanished Arcadia: Being Some Account of the Jesuits in Paraguay, 1607 to 1767‎^[2], London: Heinemann, page 278:

     […] business, as we know, is the great soberer of theorists, no matter on what side they theorize.

   • 1914, Robert W. Service, The Pretender: A Story of the Latin Quarter‎^[3], New York: A.L. Burt, Book 2, Chapter 1, p. 103:

     […] love is an intoxicant, marriage the most effective of soberers.

   • 1923, Herbert Vivian, chapter 8, in Myself Not Least, Being the Personal Reminiscences of X‎^[4], New York: H. Holt, page 136:

     One evening I stayed with him very late to celebrate the birthday of his favorite actress, and for once he was slightly the worse for liquor. […] We drove off together, arranging that I should drop him at his flat and drive on to my house. When we reached Haymarket I suggested that we should stop at one of the all-night chemists and buy him one of the mixtures known as “soberers.”

Anagrams

• rebores