Nodus tollens: the realization that the plot of your life doesn’t make sense to you anymore-that although you thought you were following the arc of the story, you keep finding yourself immersed in passages you don’t understand, that don’t even seem to belong in the same genre-which requires you to go back and reread the chapters you had originally skimmed to get to the good parts, only to learn that all along you were supposed to choose your own adventure.
K udoclasm: sometimes it feels like your life is flashing before your eyes, but it’s actually the opposite: you’re thinking forward, to all the things you haven’t done, the places you intend to visit, the goals you’ll get around to… I love the idea behind this web site, and spent some time checking out a few of the other “invented” words, and thought I’d share a few. They were not necessarily intended to be used in conversation, but to exist for their own sake to give a semblance of order to a dark continent, so you can settle it yourself on your own terms, without feeling too lost-safe in the knowledge that we’re all lost. Sonder is one of many words that can be found at The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows, a compendium of invented words written by John Koenig.Īccording to its web site, each original definition aims to fill a hole in the language-to give a name to emotions we all might experience but don’t yet have a word for. It’s a great word the problem is, it’s not quite a real word. And just as importantly, sonder reminds us that we’re all in this together. Josh Jones is a writer and musician based in Washington, DC.Sonder reminds us that each of us has a story, a story worth sharing. Oxford Scholars Name Top Ten Irritating Phrases The History of the English Language in Ten Animated Minutes The Atlas of True Names Restores Modern Cities to Their Middle Earth-ish Roots I leave it to you to visit Koenig’s Dictionary and learn what these words mean.
Some other Koenig coinages: “Ruckkehrunruhe,” “nodus tollens,” “adronitis,” “rigor samsa”…. After watching Koenig’s film, I’m thinking “sonder” is a portmanteau of “sublime” and “wonder.” It’s a mystical philosophy contained within a single made-up word. In a state of “sonder,” we suddenly occupy all of those roles at once, our screen time diminishing as others take the lead. This being an “obscure sorrow,” there’s more to it than empathy-in Koenig’s poetic video, “sonder” relates to the infinite number of overlapping stories, in which each of us feels we are the hero, others supporting cast or extras. It’s an emotion I’ve experienced, without knowing what to call it. In his short video above, he illustrates one of his words, “Sonder,” or “the realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own…”-something like the shock of sudden empathy that shakes us out of navel-gazing. Graphic designer and filmmaker John Koenig does all of these things in his “ Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows,” a blog project in which he names emotions that otherwise leave us speechless. Then again, English absorbs, cannibalizes, appropriates, steals, and bastardizes words wherever it can find them, driving lexicographers and grammar purists mad. It may be a misconception, it may be a cliché: I’m not a German speaker-but reading translator’s introductions to, say, Kant, Hegel or Goethe has convinced me that their language does a much better job than English at capturing those oddly specific twilight moods and compound feelings that so often escape definition.
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