lionise/lionize

次に引用する文もRD ６月号の "Raising Obama" と題された米国大統領候補オバマ氏の生い立ちの記事からです。
It was in Chicago that he was first visited by Auma, his older half-sister from his father's first marriage in Africa, and began to understand that the figure he knew mostly from letters and his mother's lionising memories had in fact died a broken man, his once bright hopes dimmed by political and personality conflicts with the Keyan regime, and his personal life a shambles of drinking and family dysfunction.
"lionising memories" の表現は興味を引きます。早速辞書です。"lionising" の原形 "lionise" は "lionize" とも綴られ：
Dictionary.com: to treat (a person) as a celebrity: to lionize the visiting poet.
Wiktionary: To treat (a person) as if he were important, or a celebrity.
とありましたが、"lionising memories" の目的語は人ではないので更に別の辞書を見ると（幾つもの辞書を一度に見るには辞書検索のOneLookは非常に便利です）人以外にも使えるのが分かります。
Merriam-Webster: to treat as an object of great interest or importance
この表現の面白いのは "as if" あるいは "as" が付いているところで、（普通の？）人を名士あるいは重要人物扱いあるいは "memories" などのように人/物について語る場合は美化している意味を持っている事ですね。