Word of the Day

Monday May 31, 2010

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ennui [on-WEE]

noun

1. A feeling of weariness and boredom arising from lack of interest; tedium.

• Sachar contrasts Trapp's problems of loneliness and declining health with Alton's teenage concerns and finds a meeting place at ennui; both characters are suffused with a desperate boredom that can be relieved only by playing bridge.
  Ned Vizzini, "Bridge Between Generations", New York Times Book Review, May 16, 2010
• The man behind the mask, though, is more humble, immensely appreciative of his good fortune -- and gripped by a mild case of existential ennui. It's the eternal dilemma of the world-beating conqueror: He doesn't know how to stop.
  Jeff Weiss, "Wrapper says Ludacris, but just what's inside?", Los Angeles Times, May 2, 2010
• At the age of twenty-five I returned to the chateau, there to reside as my uncle's representative, and to endure the ennui of peace.
  Charles Major (1856 - 1913) An American lawyer and novelist. Dorothy Vernon of Haddon Hall (1908)

Origin of the Word

Ennui, approximately 1667, derives from Old French enui "annoyance," from enuier, "to annoy" from the Latin, "to make hated; cause aversion."