ebullience

Borrowed from Latin ēbullientem + English -ence (suffix meaning ‘having the state or condition of’). Ēbullientem is the accusative feminine or masculine singular of ēbulliēns (“boiling”), the present participle of ēbulliō (“to boil”) (from ē- (prefix meaning ‘out, away’) + bulliō (“to bubble; to boil”) (from bulla (“bubble; bubble-shaped object”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *bʰew- (“to blow; to inflate”))) + -ēns.[1]

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ɪˈbʊl.i.əns/, /-ˈbʌl-/

• Audio (Southern England)

  (file)

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ɪˈbʊl.jəns/, /-ˈbəl-/

• Audio (GA)

  (file)

• Hyphenation: ebul‧li‧ence

ebullience (usually uncountable, plural ebulliences)

1. A boiling or bubbling up; an ebullition.
   • 1832 May, [Thomas Carlyle], “Boswell’s Life of Johnson [book review]”, in Fraser’s Magazine for Town and Country, volume V, number XXVIII, London: James Fraser […], →OCLC, page 408, column 2:

     In conversation, doubtless, you may observe him [Samuel Johnson], on occasion, fighting as if for victory;—and must pardon these ebulliences of a careless hour, which were not without temptation and provocation.

   • 1878 November, Hugh Smith Carpenter, “Nature’s Travail and Testimony”, in I[saac] K[aufmann] Funk, editor, The Preacher and the Homiletic Monthly, volume III, number 2, New York, N.Y., London: Funk & Wagnalls Company, →OCLC, page 68, column 1:

     Now an irresistible agent like this [heat] is everywhere at work in the ranges of creaturehood. It lights the stars as its jets. It bulbs the sun body with its ebullience. None the less, it tints the delicate grass blades and flower petals.

   • 1973, Oliver Sacks, “The Aftermath of the Sleeping Sickness (1927–67)”, in Awakenings, London: Duckworth, →ISBN; republished New York, N.Y.: Vintage Books, September 1999, →ISBN:

     The early days of the epidemic had been a time of ebullition or ebullience, pathologically speaking, full of movements and tics, impulsions and impetuosities, manias and crises, ardencies and appetencies.

   • 2016, David Bentley Hart, “Charles Baudelaire: From within the Veil”, in Kenneth Oakes, editor, Christian Wisdom Meets Modernity (Illuminating Modernity), London, New York, N.Y.: T&T Clark, →ISBN, section IV, page 28:

     In the end, however, rebellion must exhaust itself. We grow weary of our paltry carnal transports, our ebulliences of defiance, our abortive expeditions to the frontiers of the respectable world.

2. (figuratively) The quality of enthusiastic or lively expression of feelings and thoughts.

   Synonym: exuberance

   • 1749, Henry Fielding, “The Escape of Sophia”, in The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, volume IV, London: A[ndrew] Millar, […], →OCLC, book X, pages 81–82:

     Sophia did not ſee his Behaviour in ſo very diſadvantageous a Light, and was perhaps more pleaſed with the violent Raptures of his Love [...] than ſhe was offended with the reſt; and indeed ſhe imputed the whole to the Extravagance, or rather Ebullience, of his Paſſion, and to the Openneſs of his Heart.

   • 1771, [Henry Mackenzie], “His Skill in Physiognomy”, in The Man of Feeling, 2nd edition, London: Printed for T[homas] Cadell, […], →OCLC, page 94:

     [H]is friend, with great ebullience of paſſion, many praiſes of his own good play, and many maledictions on the power of chance, took up the cards, and threw them into the fire.

   • 1830 August 15, “Delta” [pseudonym], “The Probationer of Lochievale”, in The Atheneum; or Spirit of the English Magazines, volume IV (Third Series), number 10, Boston, Mass.: John Cotton, […], →OCLC, page 390, column 2:

     The first ebullience of parental joy at his return, together with the congratulations of his affectionate brethren, having gradually subsided, few days were indeed allowed for idle recreation; and the same industrious course was persevered in.

   • a. 1835, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, “Notes and Lectures upon Shakespeare, and Some of the Old Poets and Dramatists, […] [Romeo and Juliet]”, in Mrs. H[enry] N[elson] Coleridge, [William Greenough Thayer] Shedd, editors, The Complete Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge. […] In Seven Volumes, volumes IV (Lectures upon Shakespeare and Other Dramatists), New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], published 1854, →OCLC, page 112:

     O! how shall I describe that exquisite ebullience and overflow of youthful life, wafted on over the laughing waves of pleasure and prosperity, as a wanton beauty that distorts the face on which she knows her lover is gazing enraptured, and wrinkles her forehead in the triumph of its smoothness!

   • 1922 April, Paul Rosenfeld, “The Water-Colours of John Marin: A Note on the Work of the First American Painter of the Day”, in John Peale Bishop, editor, Vanity Fair, volume 18, number 2, New York, N.Y.: Vanity Fair Publishing Company, →OCLC, page 48, column 2:

     About John Marin, there move sad, disgruntled beings, full of talk and lamentations. [...] They bewail the fact that in America, soil is poor and unconducive to growth, and men remain unmoved by growing green. But Marin persists, and what ebullience and good humour, in the rocky ungentle loam?

   • 1975, Wilfrid Mellers, “Heterophony and Improvisation: The New Orleans Jazz Band and King Oliver; Bessie Smith and the Urban Blues”, in Music in a New Found Land: Themes and Developments in the History of American Music, New Brunswick, N.J., London: Transaction Publishers, published 2011, →ISBN, page 281:

     But if jazz was in one sense a music of rejoicing, of liberated ebuillence, it was at the same time, even in New Orleans, still a music of protest: [...]

   • 1999, Christine Rauchfuss Gray, “Afterword”, in Willis Richardson, Forgotten Pioneer of African-American Drama (Contributions in Afro-American and African Studies; no. 190), Westport, Conn., London: Greenwood Press, →ISBN, →ISSN, page 105:

     The actual lives led by most African Americans were much different from the grinning masks and the ebullience displayed on stage.

   • 2010 June, Michael Salvatore, chapter 1, in Between Boyfriends, New York, N.Y.: Kensington Books, →ISBN, page 3:

     When I first met him in the wee hours of the morning of this very day, I sensed he possessed an ebullience and intelligence that I had not encountered for the longest time.

   • 2012, P. D. Smith, “History”, in City: A Guidebook for the Urban Age, London, New York, N.Y.: Bloomsbury Publishing, →ISBN, page 64:

     Although it is invariably urban in its setting, Carnival is bigger than any one city or religion. Its ebullience and dynamism is a natural florescence of dense communities.

• ebulliency