Nothing deep here, just wondering how you pronounce the word, "Nihilist"
I've always thought it was Nile (as in the river) ist
dictionary.com says
Nay-uh-list
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/in...4153358AA2uZiy
someone else's yahoo question doesn't seem to have a strong answer.
What do you guys think?
Told by a fool, signifying nothing.
I've always pronounced it like Nile...
I've always pronounced the 'Ni' as unvoiced, as in 'Nil', and the 'hi' rhyming with it. That said, I sure it doesn't matter that much!
"I should only believe in a God that would know how to dance. And when I saw my devil, I found him serious, thorough, profound, solemn: he was the spirit of gravity- through him all things fall. Not by wrath, but by laughter, do we slay. Come, let us slay the spirit of gravity!" - Nietzsche
Ny-Uh-list.
I'm losing all those stupid games
That I swore I'd never play
Annihilation.
extract the -nihil- (keep the pronunciation!)
add -ist
(or -ism)
Voila!
Make any sense?
com-pas-sion (n.) [ME. & OFr. <LL. (Ec.) compassio, sympathy < compassus, pp. of compati, to feel pity < L. com-, together + pali, to suffer] sorrow for the sufferings or trouble of another or others, accompanied by an urge to help; deep sympathy; pity
Dostoevsky Forum!
perfect. And that's the way I'd always said it... but it seemed as though people were uncertain... *shrug. Thanks. Problem resolved. I ask that people only post now if they disagree.
Told by a fool, signifying nothing.
Thats the way i have always said it for that exact reason Dori.
"Come away O human child!To the waters of the wild, With a faery hand in hand, For the worlds more full of weeping than you can understand."
W.B.Yeats
"If it looks like a Dwarf and smells like a Dwarf, then it's probably a Dwarf (or a latrine wearing dungarees)"
Artemins Fowl and the Lost Colony by Eoin Colfer
my poems-please comment Forum Rules
I pronounce "nihilist" Knee-ill-ist. It's from the Latin nihil, pronounced nee-hill. (or ni-hil as Lokasenna describes it)
Last edited by Whifflingpin; 03-11-2009 at 07:09 PM.
Voices mysterious far and near,
Sound of the wind and sound of the sea,
Are calling and whispering in my ear,
Whifflingpin! Why stayest thou here?
The British--and, IMO, proper--way to pronounce it is, like Dori said, similar to annihilation.
However, the common American way is with an /e/ sound, like "knee." Personally, I think this is etymologically incorrect, given the common "long-short" same vowel pronunciation of Latin roots, but whatever floats your boat I guess.
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/dict.asp?Word=nihilism
This site used to have both American and British pronunciation of words, but I don't see it anymore. Maybe you can find it.
"For a man to conquer himself is the first and noblest of all victories." - Plato
"Out of damp and gloomy days, out of solitude, out of loveless words directed at us, conclusions grow up in us like fungus: one morning they are there, we know not how, and they gaze upon us, morose and gray. Woe to the thinker who is not the gardener but only the soil of the plants that grow in him."- Friedrich Nietzsche
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