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The French loanword ennui comes from the very same Late Latin word that gave us annoy — inodiare ("to make loathsome"). We borrowed ennui several centuries after absorbing annoy into the language. Ennui deals more with boredom than irritation - and a somewhat specific sort of boredom at that. It generally refers to the feeling of jadedness that can result from living a life of too much ease. The poet Charles Lloyd described it well in his 1823 Stanzas to Ennui when he referred to that world-weary sensation as a "soul-destroying fiend" which visits with its "pale unrest / The chambers of the human breast / Where too much happiness hath fixed its home."
Examples of ennui in a Sentence
Roger G. Newton, The Truth of Science, 1997
Chauncey and I were keen enough about our aesthetic solution to the ennui of war to try to proselytize others. He organized discussion groups with the crew; I took volunteers to visit landmarks …
—Louis Auchincloss, "Atlantic War,"
in Authors at Sea, ed. Robert Shenk, 1997
The attendant outside was standing on tennis balls, exercising the soles of her feet, her body swaying back and forth with the ennui of jelly.
—Edna O'Brien, New Yorker, 17 June 1991
Thus the days of life are consumed, one by one, without an object beyond the present moment; ever flying from the ennui of that, yet carrying it with us …
—Thomas Jefferson, in a letter dated 7 Feb. 1787
Thomas Jefferson: Writings, 1984
the kind of ennui that comes from having too much time on one's hands and too little will to find something productive to do
Samantha Bergeson, IndieWire, 21 May 2025
Everyone is thinking about his or her middle-aged ennui and the routines — ruts?
—Margaret Lyons, New York Times, 1 May 2025
Still, the ludicrously campy show is jaw-dropping in its commitment to delivering intensely dark, modern content to audiences grappling with the slippery ethics and general ennui of living in the 2020s.
—Wilson Chapman, IndieWire, 20 May 2025
And my too evident ennui and lack of lust for life on this cold and still dark early morning.
—New York Times Games, New York Times, 10 Apr. 2025
See All Example Sentences for ennui
Cite this Entry
“Ennui.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ennui. Accessed 10 Jun. 2025.
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