Crossword clues for dilettante
dilettante
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Dilettante \Dil`et*tan"te\, n.; pl. Dilettanti. [It., prop. p. pr. of dillettare to take delight in, fr. L. delectare to delight. See Delight, v. t.] An admirer or lover of the fine arts; popularly, an amateur; especially, one who follows an art or a branch of knowledge, desultorily, or for amusement only.
The true poet is not an eccentric creature, not a mere
artist living only for art, not a dreamer or a
dilettante, sipping the nectar of existence, while he
keeps aloof from its deeper interests.
--J. C.
Shairp.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
1733, borrowing of Italian dilettante "lover of music or painting," from dilettare "to delight," from Latin delectare (see delight (n.)). Originally without negative connotation, "devoted amateur," the pejorative sense emerged late 18c. by contrast with professional.
Wiktionary
a. Pertaining to or like a dilettante. n. 1 An amateur, someone who dabbles in a field out of casual interest rather than as a profession or serious interest. 2 (context sometimes offensive English) A person with a general but superficial interest in any art or a branch of knowledge.
WordNet
adj. showing frivolous or superficial interest; amateurish; "his dilettantish efforts at painting" [syn: dilettantish, dilettanteish, sciolistic]
[also: dilettanti (pl)]
n. an amateur who engages in an activity without serious intentions and who pretends to have knowledge [syn: dabbler, sciolist]
[also: dilettanti (pl)]
Wikipedia
A contemporary understanding is that dilettante is a person who enjoys the arts or someone who engages in a field without investing the usually required effort. However the original definition was of an aristocratic person who was not required to work and so devoted his time instead to cultural pursuits.
The word may also refer to:
- An amateur, someone with a casual or superficial interest
- A layperson, someone without formal qualifications within a specific field
- Dilettante (album), a 2005 album by Ali Project
- Dilettantes (album), a 2008 album by You Am I
- Dilettante Music, a classical music website with social networking features
- The Dilettantes, a San Francisco neo-psychedelic rock band
- A member of the Dilettante Society
Dilettante is Ali Project's twelfth album. The album includes Chinkon Shou, the B-side from their single for Code Geass. The album reached #116 on the Japanese Oricon chart, and charted for 1 week, selling 2,192 copies.
Usage examples of "dilettante".
He was less approving of Mussolini, who was a dabbler and a dilettante.
The hero is Sandor Dyle, a wealthy dilettante with a talent for pattern analysis.
Although not a dilettante but a hardworking enthusiast of the fleet, his inveterate jobbery left dockyards a scandal, provisioners defrauded and ships unseaworthy.
And, dilettante that he was, he completely failed to grasp the mediagenic advantages of Eleanor Richmond.
The fact is that I object to being regarded as a mere romancist, even as a dead-head speculator, or dilettante reporter, of the drama of life.
A Report concerning a painting academy where nude studies were made, from models of both sexes, while scholars only twelve or thirteen years of age were admitted, and where dilettantes who were neither painters nor designers, attended the sessions.
Willie had come nearer and nearer to the decision that at the piano he was an untalented dilettante.
Not, as previously, in his capacity as a dilettante astrologer, but as the manager, organizer, fund-raiser, and recruiter par excellence for the Parapsychic Center.
He considered the Milk Duds recorder quite a cool hack, and he thought that the codez themselves might be an entree to the clannish hackers and crackers, who scorned dilettantes and warez kidz, but who were always looking for ways to steal phone calls.
It was supposed from the low price that these concerts would be beneath the notice of the high toned dilettanti of the city, but the performance last evening has completely disabused not only the nicely-critical, but the public generally of this idea.
The Gotham Roses are not dilettantes trying on crime-fighting for a hobby.
The liquored-up gyrenes did not take kindly to being called pacifistic dilettantes, especially by a suntanned civilian with a German accent.
The idea of cloning has been explored widely in fiction, but always in terms of medical technology involving complex machinery, a dilettante obsession for the very rich.
Furnberg and the success of his compositions for that nobleman at once gave him a distinction among the musicians and dilettanti of Vienna.
Besides, as arguments in favor of Homoeopathy are constantly addressed to the public in journals, pamphlets, and even lectures, by inexperienced dilettanti, the same channel must be open to all its opponents.