Quote:
Originally Posted by HarryT
I'm sure that most of us here have read "Bleak House" by Charles Dickens - one of the greats of English literature. When you read it, you may perhaps even have noticed this sentence, describing Lady Dedlock, which occurs near the start of Chapter 12:
But what you may not have realised, when you read this, is that you were looking at the first ever usage in the English language of the word "Boredom". Until this sentence was written, the word did not exist. Dickens needed the word, and invented it, and that's one of the many reasons that he's considered a great writer; he invented hundred of words which are today regarded as an everyday part of the language. Among his other inventions are "rampage", "red tape", and "around the clock". The OED lists 258 words which were first used by Dickens.
My question to you as writers, is this: would you have the courage to invent a new word if there was no existing word to describe the concept that you were looking for?
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He also borrowed from earlier writers I think. Giant Despair was mentioned in Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress I believe. And Bunyan took his inspiration from the Bible. It's interesting how different books have influenced a given writer over the centuries. I believe both Shakespeare and the Apostle Paul also had a tendency to create new words when needed to get their points across as well.