Schadenfreude
Jan. 5th, 2004 05:55 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jamesqSchadenfreude \SHAHD-n-froy-duh\, noun: A malicious satisfaction in the misfortunes of others.
I've always thought that we needed an English version of this word - it's clearly a universal human emotion, but strangely it took the Germans to name it. Perhaps damage-joy, which is from Schadenfreude's root words. Damned-joy?
I bring this up because I've wanted a word for the opposite feeling almost as long. A word to describe the pissed-off feeling you get when good things happen to other people - especially people you don't like. It could be German, or better yet Latin! This would give it a superior air.
I gave up on this when I found out that English does have such a word, and it's not superior at all:
Bitterness.
I've always thought that we needed an English version of this word - it's clearly a universal human emotion, but strangely it took the Germans to name it. Perhaps damage-joy, which is from Schadenfreude's root words. Damned-joy?
I bring this up because I've wanted a word for the opposite feeling almost as long. A word to describe the pissed-off feeling you get when good things happen to other people - especially people you don't like. It could be German, or better yet Latin! This would give it a superior air.
I gave up on this when I found out that English does have such a word, and it's not superior at all:
Bitterness.
