So many beautiful words out there, gesturing to us, bringing things closer, without ever quite touching. My most recent novel opens with an elderly man in a ‘care’ facility, considering words related to ‘home,’ and having your home stolen from you, and how some languages reduce a word’s scope, and some expand it. The word ‘heimilislegt,’ for example, in his parents’ native Icelandic, simply means ‘homely,’ whereas in the German in a novel he’s reading, there is the word ‘heimisch,’ which means ‘homely,’ but expands to ‘familiar, native, at home.’ Icelandic has the word ‘heimfuss,’ meaning longing for home.’ German has ‘heimweh’ - home pain - to set against your tugging ‘fernweh.’ Surely every language has a word for homesick, but how many, I wonder, have a word for wanderlust.
This is so beautiful - thank you for sharing it. Your novel sounds wonderful, and I love the idea of words expanding or contracting the same feeling depending on the language - it very much reminds me of weathering. Also 'heimweh' against 'fernweh' is such a perfect pairing and I hadn't heard of this - home pain and farsickness, pulling in opposite directions. Wonderful.
So many beautiful words out there, gesturing to us, bringing things closer, without ever quite touching. My most recent novel opens with an elderly man in a ‘care’ facility, considering words related to ‘home,’ and having your home stolen from you, and how some languages reduce a word’s scope, and some expand it. The word ‘heimilislegt,’ for example, in his parents’ native Icelandic, simply means ‘homely,’ whereas in the German in a novel he’s reading, there is the word ‘heimisch,’ which means ‘homely,’ but expands to ‘familiar, native, at home.’ Icelandic has the word ‘heimfuss,’ meaning longing for home.’ German has ‘heimweh’ - home pain - to set against your tugging ‘fernweh.’ Surely every language has a word for homesick, but how many, I wonder, have a word for wanderlust.
This is so beautiful - thank you for sharing it. Your novel sounds wonderful, and I love the idea of words expanding or contracting the same feeling depending on the language - it very much reminds me of weathering. Also 'heimweh' against 'fernweh' is such a perfect pairing and I hadn't heard of this - home pain and farsickness, pulling in opposite directions. Wonderful.