Killing Time. Ennui in Eighteenth-Century English Culture

Killing Time. Ennui in Eighteenth-Century English Culture

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The article explores the meanings of ennui in eighteenth-century England.Based on text searches, Oil Filter it proposes that the French term ennui was adopted into everyday usage in England around the mid-century, and was from the 1770s onwards used to signify especially the temporal aspects of the word, that is, boredom.Ennui was closely tied to social rank: it was thought to plague the wealthy if they had too much time on their hands.Interestingly, ennui was not particularly Alarms - Alarm Systems gendered, but plagued both men and women.It was intrinsically related to lifestyles.

A multitude of activities were proposed to avoid ennui, from reading to physical exercise.Avoidance was a question of life and death: ennui could lead to moral collapse and ultimately to suicide, killing not only the body but also the soul.