Klexos: The Art of Dwelling on the Past

At The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows, John Koenig has created a compendium of invented words.

Each original definition aims to fill a hole in the language—to give a name to emotions we all might experience but don’t yet have a word for.

Words that appear to have classical origins are given beautiful, gemlike definitions:

Lachesism

n. the desire to be struck by disaster—to survive a plane crash, to lose everything in a fire, to plunge over a waterfall—which would put a kink in the smooth arc of your life, and forge it into something hardened and flexible and sharp, not just a stiff prefabricated beam that barely covers the gap between one end of your life and the other.

And some have miniature art films to illustrate their concept, such as klexos, ‘the art of dwelling in the past.’

There are ways of thinking about the past that aren’t just nostalgia or regret–a kind of questioning that enriches the experience after the fact…

As memoirists and essay writers, the video for klexos is a gorgeous way to start your morning and think about your work–even if, as Koenig recommends, “All content is intended to be read at night.”

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Allison K Williams is Brevity’s Social Media Editor and the author of Seven Drafts: Self-Edit Like a Pro from Blank Page to Book. Want writing news, events, and upcoming webinars? Join the A-List!