panache

noun

Etymology: Unadapted borrowing from French panache, from Middle French pennache (“plume of feathers”), from Italian pennacchio, from Late Latin pinnāculum. Doublet of pinnacle.

1. An ornamental plume on a helmet.

   “I had taken the panache from my shako so that it might escape notice, but even with my fine overcoat I feared that sooner or later my uniform would betray me.”

2. Flamboyance, energetic style or action.

   “One old gentleman, who was in the habit of reading a Paris newspaper and knew things, chuckled gleefully to everybody that Alcée’s conduct was altogether chic, mais chic. That he had more panache than Boulanger. Well, perhaps he had.”

   “Cyberpunk caters to the wish-fulfillment requirements of male teen-agers, but this is a job that can be done with varying degrees of panache, and there is currently no more accomplished caterer than William Gibson.”