Illeism
Pronunciation
- RP IPA: /ˈɪliËɪzÉ™m/
- GA IPA: /ˈɪliɪzəm/
- Hyphenation: il + le + i + sm
Origin
File:Bust of Julius Caesar from History of the World (1902).png|thumb|upright|An engraving of the 1st century BC bust of Julius Caesar from the Farnese collection, on display at the National Archaeological Museum, Naples in Naples, Italy.
From .
In his Commentarii de Bello Gallico (Commentaries on the Gallic Wars, 58–49 BC), Caesar used illeism to give an air of impartiality to the account, including
From + -ism, modelled on egoism.
Full definition of illeism
Noun
illeism
(uncountable)- (often linguistics) The practice of (excessively) referring to oneself in the third person.
- 2002, Lewis Walker, comp., Shakespeare and the Classical Tradition: An Annotated Bibliography 1961–1991 Chapter General Works (Items 0067–1154), ... "Illeism with a difference" occurs when a character, speaking in the first person, refers to himself by name (not simply by a pronoun, which is illeism proper). w
- 2005, S. Viswanathan, Exploring Shakespeare: The Dynamics of Playmaking Chapter ‘Illeism with a Difference’ in Certain Middle Plays, In origin, the device of ‘illeism’ is a joint legacy to Elizabethan drama of the native English medieval stage tradition and of the w:Seneca the Younger
- 2007, Anu Garg, The Dord, the Diglot, and an Avocado or Two: The Hidden Lives and Strange Origins of Words Chapter Words to Describe People: Insults, For some reason, illeism is especially attractive to professional sports players. The award for the best display of illeism has to go to baseball player Rickey Henderson, who left this message on his manager's voice-mail: "Kevin, this is Rickey, calling on behalf of Rickey" (quoted in Sports Illustrated).
- 2007, Douglas Bruster, Thomas Middleton and Early Modern Textual Culture: A Companion to the Collected Works Chapter w, It seems likely that Isabella's 'how she treads the air' is the kind of illeism that Franciscus uses later in this scene at line 216: 'He handles him like a feather. Hey!' ... It should be noticed that some editors are confused by Franciscus's illeism as well, and give his line to Lollio.