horrificness
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English
[edit]Etymology
[edit]Noun
[edit]horrificness (uncountable)
- The quality of being horrific.
- Synonyms: (rare) horrificality, (rare) horrificity
- 1919 March 31, W[ilhelm] N[ero] P[ilate] Barbellion [pseudonym; Bruce Frederick Cummings], “[[1915] May 27.] The Pool: A Retrospect”, in The Journal of a Disappointed Man, London: Chatto & Windus, published 27 April 1920 (5th impression), →OCLC, part II (In London), page 190:
- Everything is absolutely still, air and water are stagnant. A large Dytiscus beetle rises to the surface to breathe and every now and then large bubbles of marsh gas come sailing majestically up from the depth and explode quietly into the fetid air. The horrificness of this place impressed me even when I was intent only on fishing there for bugs and efts. Now, seen in retrospect, it haunts me.
- 2009 January 27, Micol Ostow, “Chock-full o’ OMG”, in GoldenGirl (A Bradford Novel), New York, N.Y.: Simon Pulse, →ISBN, page 136:
- I suppose the last thing someone in my nervous state needed was caffeine, but that didn’t stop me from hitting the ’Bucks with Madison and Paige before school the next morning for a soothing Chai latte. Something told me that was the only soothing I’d be having, at least until stolen-paper-culprit had been identified and the horrificness had been resolved.
- 2016, Rosie Blake, chapter 15, in How to Find Your (First) Husband, London: Corvus, →ISBN, page 129:
- I lay there, momentarily shell-shocked as, hungover and jet-lagged, I tried to remember what I was doing today. Something important. Lurching bolt upright, the room spinning in all its lilac horrificness, I remembered Tioman, and the flight that was booked – the daily flight, the only flight.