I am a misoneist. Men of genius, Conservative politicians, lunatics, and savages are afflicted with misoneism. Therefore, since modesty will not permit of my claiming for myself a place among the first class, I prefer to include myself among the last. But what is misoneism? It is the Greek for "hatred of novelty"; an instinctive reluctance to adopt new-fangled notions, or to take advantage of modern inventions and conveniences.Greek has many compounds beginning with μισο-, but none of those compounds (so far as I can tell) end with elements meaning new (νέος, καινός). According to the Oxford English Dictionary, misoneism comes from Italian misoneismo (itself of course inspired by Greek).
"A peculiar anthologic maze, an amusing literary chaos, a farrago of quotations, a mere olla podrida of quaintness, a pot pourri of pleasant delites, a florilegium of elegant extracts, a tangled fardel of old-world flowers of thought, a faggot of odd fancies, quips, facetiae, loosely tied" (Holbrook Jackson, Anatomy of Bibliomania) by a "laudator temporis acti," a "praiser of time past" (Horace, Ars Poetica 173).
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Friday, October 27, 2017
Misoneism
Conall Cearnach (i.e. Frederick William O'Connell),"On Early Rising," The Age of Whitewash (Dublin: M.H. Gill & Son Ltd., 1921), pp. 108-111 (at 108):