Wollah

a person with shapes raining on them

Wollah

n.
something you’ve misunderstood for years without knowing it—a familiar word with a weird pronunciation, a favorite saying that means the opposite of what you thought, a well-known factoid that was disproven years ago while you weren’t looking—making you want to stress-test the foundations of your understanding of reality.

A mispronunciation of the French voilà, “behold!” Pronounced “wawl-uh.”

Adomania

a person riding a horse

Aponemia

a group of people standing together

Kadot

a person looking at an abstract spiral

Craxis

a tall house of cards

Hem-Jawed

an abstract image of someone touching their face

Nilous

a person standing at a bus terminal

Furosha

a storm raging in the sky over a building

Dystoria

close up of water drops on a window

Evertheless

a person floating in water

Starlorn

snow flakes in the dark

Tornomov

a cloudy sky and landscape

Ecsis

a hand holding a fossil

Grayshift

a spiral staircase from above

Karanoia

a neat stack of white paper

Winnewaw

a person wearing a party hat

Irrition

a close up of a dandelion

Ironsick

a group of random devices

Achenia

a close-up of a bottle with an organic object inside

Fitzcarraldo

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

Offtides

close-up of a chromed metal object

Routwash

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

Fardle-Din

Cover image for the Fardle-Din word card on the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

Cullaways

a lone sand castle on a beach at low tide

Looseleft

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

Plata Rasa

Cover image for the Plata Rasa word card on the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

Zielschmerz

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

Gaudia Civis

a close-up of a gear