Word of the Day

Thursday, June 21, 2001

languor

\LANG-guhr; LANG-uhr\ , noun;

Mental or physical weariness or fatigue.

Listless indolence, especially the indolence of one who is satiated by a life of luxury or pleasure.

A heaviness or oppressive stillness of the air.

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Quotes:

Without health life is not life, wrote Rabelais, "life is not livable. . . . Without health life is nothing but languor."

-- Joseph Epstein, Narcissus Leaves the Pool

Charles's court exuded a congenial hedonism. It was exuberant and intemperate, given to both languor and excess.

-- John Brewer, The Pleasures of the Imagination

Outside the window, New Orleans . . . brooded in a faintly tarnished languor, like an aging yet still beautiful courtesan in a smokefilled room, avid yet weary too of ardent ways.

-- Thomas S. Hines, William Faulkner and the Tangible Past

Sleep and dreams would swallow up the languor of daytime.

-- Patrick Chamoiseau, School Days (translated by Linda Coverdale)

Origin:

Languor is from Latin languor, from languere, "to be faint or weak." The adjective form is languorous.