Yearnful

Origin

From Middle English yernful, from Old English Ä¡iernful ("desirous, eager, zealous, diligent, anxious"), equivalent to yearn + -ful.

Full definition of yearnful

Adjective

1. Filled with yearning; desirous; mournful; distressing.
• So now lend me thy yearnful tunes to utter my sorrow.
• 1886, w, Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow Chapter , Ah! they were grand days, those deep, full days, when our coming life, like an unseen organ, pealed strange, yearnful music in our ears, and our young blood cried out like a war-horse for the battle.
• 1919, Albert Payson Terhune, O Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1919 Chapter The Strike, I am yearnful to know who was the unhappy person the wicked general threatened.

Derived terms

• yearnfully
• yearnfulness

Usage notes

This term was once widely and disapprovingly attributed to the poet John Keats.

1900, Rupert Hughes, Contemporary American Composers Chapter , It abounded in emotion, and was--to use the impossible word Keats coined--"yearnful."

Men of genius have been guilty of some queer word-coinages. Keats coined the impossible word yearnful; but this was not his gravest offense.

1903, Rupert Hughes, The Love Affairs of Great Musicians, Volume 1 Chapter , This is the last of these letters to which one could apply so fitly the barbarous word "yearnful," once coined by Keats.