For me a pleasant sadness is thinking of my Dad, something he said or did that was amusing and makes me smile but brings a little pain that he is no longer here.
Autumn is the perfect time to indulge in such thoughts, particularly as he died in November.
It was 14 years ago so the pain is no longer fresh and I sometimes enjoy looking at photos and listening to sad songs and feeling melancholy remembering him. I am sad but it’s a pleasant feeling.
There is in my mind no connection between melancholy and depression.
I wonder if the Irish have a word. There's an awful lot of take me back to Ireland songs. I suspect many of them were written by second/ third generation Americans who'd never even been there, though.
The Welsh have a similar word: hiraeth. I think it's a beautiful concept - and its sound conjures up its meaning too, to me. https://forvo.com/word/hiraeth/
'If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need.'
Hello Dove and Deb's,, the dictionary definition of melancholy is mental depression of course there is a connection between the two. They are degrees of depression. Don't think there can be any other type, other than mental. I don't like the word melancholy,it's miserable, it's unpleasant in its original Greek form, melanomas, internal bleeding, even the choli ...bile, gastric disorders.why is this section under "wildlife gardening"
And I've always loved autumn (I have an October birthday). November especially is a month of wistful longing I think, as we watch things die away.
However, my autumnal feelings in general are optimistic - I always get a burst of energy in September/October as I don't think I've ever got past that lovely 'start of term, new satchel and pencil case' feeling. It's a new beginning in my world, full of possibility. Pretty much every job I've had I've started in autumn!
'If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need.'
Understandably, with your professional background and personal experiences, you are coming at this subject from a medical point of view.
However, words and phrases change through time and can be quite nuanced... e.g. sentimentality used to be seen as a positive thing, nowadays it's usually regarded as implying over-emotional saccharine stuff.
The word depression has several meanings ... it can be used for the hollow in a cushion left by a cat as well as for a meterological phenomenon ... it can mean a hollow in a landscape where a dew-pond can form ... some people use it to describe 'feeling down' ... and in medicine it has a very precise meaning ... but that medical meaning does not negate all the other uses of the word 'depression'.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
But despite the root of the word, it’s an extremely outdated term to apply to clinical depression, Nanny. As Allotment Boy says, language and it’s meaning changes. Doctors no longer diagnose ‘Melancholia’ any more than they diagnose ‘Black Bile’.
Melancholy is defined by Collins as ‘a sad thoughtful state of mind’ and the OED gives multiple meanings including ‘a [temporary] sadness and depression of spirits’ and ‘A tender or pensive sadness’ - that’s what we are discussing here.
Mountainous Northern Catalunya, Spain. Hot summers, cold winters.
I know what you mean, @LG_ I'm a retired teacher and September is always my new year, even now. I still feel myself gearing up, making plans, looking for a fresh start.
The English language is incredibly flexible. There are so many words with myriad meanings, as @Dovefromabove points out with 'depression'. Dictionaries are a great help when you want to begin exploring a word, but you need to look at everyday use, our popular and literary heritage, too.
It's one of my greatest regrets that when I was a callow schoolchild I imagined I didn't need a foreign language so I cannot speak with authority, but I would guess that these changes and nuances have their place in most languages, particularly those that are so very old.
To me depression is a mental Illness not to be confused with sadness or even grief. I see it as the darkest blue, the black dog even. It must be terrible but it’s an illness not an emotion.
Melancholy is the palest blue, smelling wood smoke or seeing autumn leaves against a sunny sky, a sad song or words in a book or poem, remembering happy times and missing someone and indulging those emotions, wallowing in them for a very short time. So many lovely posts on this thread that bring a tear to the eye .
Posts
@Simone_in_Wiltshire is talking about a cultural and artistic construct that has become embedded in the character of a nation.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
https://forvo.com/word/hiraeth/
And I've always loved autumn (I have an October birthday). November especially is a month of wistful longing I think, as we watch things die away.
However, my autumnal feelings in general are optimistic - I always get a burst of energy in September/October as I don't think I've ever got past that lovely 'start of term, new satchel and pencil case' feeling. It's a new beginning in my world, full of possibility. Pretty much every job I've had I've started in autumn!
https://penandpension.com/2019/07/03/melancholy-and-the-romantic-movement/
Think of the poets of the Romantic Movement, Keats, Byron, Shelley etc. and the work of some of the great German landscape painters associated with the Romantic Movement https://www.barnebys.com/blog/caspar-david-friedrich-the-melancholy-romantic
Understandably, with your professional background and personal experiences, you are coming at this subject from a medical point of view.
However, words and phrases change through time and can be quite nuanced... e.g. sentimentality used to be seen as a positive thing, nowadays it's usually regarded as implying over-emotional saccharine stuff.
The word depression has several meanings ... it can be used for the hollow in a cushion left by a cat as well as for a meterological phenomenon ... it can mean a hollow in a landscape where a dew-pond can form ... some people use it to describe 'feeling down' ... and in medicine it has a very precise meaning ... but that medical meaning does not negate all the other uses of the word 'depression'.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Melancholy is defined by Collins as ‘a sad thoughtful state of mind’ and the OED gives multiple meanings including ‘a [temporary] sadness and depression of spirits’ and ‘A tender or pensive sadness’ - that’s what we are discussing here.
The English language is incredibly flexible. There are so many words with myriad meanings, as @Dovefromabove points out with 'depression'. Dictionaries are a great help when you want to begin exploring a word, but you need to look at everyday use, our popular and literary heritage, too.
It's one of my greatest regrets that when I was a callow schoolchild I imagined I didn't need a foreign language so I cannot speak with authority, but I would guess that these changes and nuances have their place in most languages, particularly those that are so very old.