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  • The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

  • Written by: John Koenig
  • Narrated by: John Koenig
  • Length: 4 hrs and 42 mins
  • 5.0 out of 5 stars (7 ratings)

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The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

Written by: John Koenig
Narrated by: John Koenig
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Publisher's Summary

New York Times best seller

“It’s undeniably thrilling to find words for our strangest feelings…Koenig casts light into lonely corners of human experience…. An enchanting book." (The Washington Post)

A truly original book in every sense of the word, The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows poetically defines emotions that we all feel but don’t have the words to express - until now.

Have you ever wondered about the lives of each person you pass on the street, realizing that everyone is the main character in their own story, each living a life as vivid and complex as your own? That feeling has a name: sonder. Or maybe you’ve watched a thunderstorm roll in and felt a primal hunger for disaster, hoping it would shake up your life. That’s called lachesism. Or you were looking through old photos and felt a pang of nostalgia for a time you’ve never actually experienced. That’s anemoia.

If you’ve never heard of these terms before, that’s because they didn’t exist until John Koenig set out to fill the gaps in our language of emotion. The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows “creates beautiful new words that we need but do not yet have,” says John Green, best-selling author of The Fault in Our Stars. By turns poignant, relatable, and mind-bending, the definitions include whimsical etymologies drawn from languages around the world, interspersed with otherworldly collages and lyrical essays that explore forgotten corners of the human condition - from astrophe, the longing to explore beyond the planet Earth, to zenosyne, the sense that time keeps getting faster.

The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows is for anyone who enjoys a shift in perspective, pondering the ineffable feelings that make up our lives. This is the perfect gift for creatives, word nerds, and human beings everywhere.

©2021 John Koenig. All rights reserved. From “The Separate Notebooks: A Mirrored Gallery” from The Separate Notebooks by Czeslaw Milosz. Copyright ©1984 by Czeslaw Milosz Inc. Used by permission of HarperCollins Publishers. From The Painted Drum by Louise Erdrich. Copyright ©2005 by Louise Erdrich. Used by permission of HarperCollins Publishers. From "The Unbearable Lightness of Being" by Milan Kundera. English translation copyright © 1984 by Harper & Row, Publishers, Inc. Translated from Nesnesitelná lehkost bytí, copyright ©1984 by Milan Kundera. Used by permission of HarperCollins Publishers. (P)2021 Simon & Schuster, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Existential Therapy

The premise is simple, the experiences are mundane, but the colour that John Koenig paints, lifts the reader to a space in between meaning and reality. Absolutley perfect for unplugging from the busy "hum" of being human.

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Amazing Book…

It’s like reading an adventure of yourself. It feels like you are expanding your horizon.

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