Thank you for this post. The concept of saudade feels like it has significant overlap and kinship with the Russian toska. As per Nabokov:
Toska - noun /ˈtō-skə/ - Russian word roughly translated as sadness, melancholia, lugubriousness.
"No single word in English renders all the shades of toska. At its deepest and most painful, it is a sensation of great spiritual anguish, often without any specific cause. At less morbid levels it is a dull ache of the soul, a longing with nothing to long for, a sick pining, a vague restlessness, mental throes, yearning. In particular cases it may be the desire for somebody of something specific, nostalgia, love-sickness. At the lowest level it grades into ennui, boredom.”
Thanks for your comment! That russian word "toska" seems to also be very difficult to fully comprehend, but these difficult and mysterious words are the best words, because they hide deeper meanings.
Thank you for this post. The concept of saudade feels like it has significant overlap and kinship with the Russian toska. As per Nabokov:
Toska - noun /ˈtō-skə/ - Russian word roughly translated as sadness, melancholia, lugubriousness.
"No single word in English renders all the shades of toska. At its deepest and most painful, it is a sensation of great spiritual anguish, often without any specific cause. At less morbid levels it is a dull ache of the soul, a longing with nothing to long for, a sick pining, a vague restlessness, mental throes, yearning. In particular cases it may be the desire for somebody of something specific, nostalgia, love-sickness. At the lowest level it grades into ennui, boredom.”
Thanks for your comment! That russian word "toska" seems to also be very difficult to fully comprehend, but these difficult and mysterious words are the best words, because they hide deeper meanings.