Timonization

noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    The transformation of someone into a bitter misanthrope, a Timonist, like Timon of Athens.

    "Among these lesser tragic influences the misanthropic concept of Timonization which seemed to obsess Melville so, and which has its origin in Shakespeare's Timon of Athens, is mentioned twice in Pierre …"

Example

More examples

"Among these lesser tragic influences the misanthropic concept of Timonization which seemed to obsess Melville so, and which has its origin in Shakespeare's Timon of Athens, is mentioned twice in Pierre …"

Etymology

From Timonize + -ation, after the 5th-century-BCE person Timon of Athens (as described by Plutarch, Lucian, and Aristophanes), possibly by way of William Shakespeare's play Timon of Athens (c. 1607). Used by Raymond Ronald Long in his study The Hidden Sun (1965).

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.