Ringlorn

Cover image for the Ringlorn word card on the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

Ringlorn

adj.
the wish that the modern world felt as epic as the one depicted in old stories and folktales—a place of tragedy and transcendence, of oaths and omens and fates, where everyday life felt like a quest for glory, a mythic bond with an ancient past, or a battle for survival against a clear enemy, rather than an open-ended parlor game where all the rules are made up and the points don’t matter.

From ring, a key element in many sagas and myths + -lorn, sorely missing. Pronounced “ring- lawrn.”

Idlewild

Cover image for the Idlewild word card on the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

Proluctance

Cover image for the Proluctance word card on the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

Wenbane

a person standing on a ledge looking at a city skyline

Wollah

a person with shapes raining on them

Fellchaser

a blurred shadow of a person in a dark room

Mithenness

a person standing on the side of a road