High Hopes

Mr. Micawber from David Copperfield

Micawberism: Probably the only one word whose meaning I understood because I knew the the etymology first! Serendipitous that it may seem, must thank the education authorities for having inducted David Copperfield. Oh yes! thanks Mr. Dickens too!

Meaning: Eternal optimism almost to a fault...the feeling "something will turn up!"
(I defined that myself... yo! )

Etymology: (this is the interesting part...) derived from the classic character Mr. Wilkins Micawber from Charles Dickens' famous book David Coppefield. Mr. Micawber is an incorrigible optimist; hounded by debt and penury, he comes across as one of the "happiest" characters in a novel that in true Dickensian style is replete with Victorian squalor, tears, despondence and the ilk.
(He talks of buying stuff for his home when the last conversation he had was about his debts...on a first reading it seemed so surely-out-of-place I actually flipped back to see if I had missed any pages!)

Usage: "The children and their mother lived from hand to mouth; there is more than a touch of Micawberism in the way they got by -- high spirits in the midst of semipenury."
The New York Times, Dec. 30, 2001... for the full article click here

"Psychoanalysis recognises a tendency known as negative hallucination — normal hallucinations involve seeing things that aren’t there, negative hallucinations consist of not seeing things that are there. And so some people insist that nothing unnatural is happening to the climate, while others argue a kind of environmental Micawberism — something (usually technological) will definitely turn up; it always does."
The Times, Oct. 31, 2006... for the full article click here

"A word on the current wave of Micawberism, fed by misleading or mendacious reports that the surge is succeeding; the Iraqi government, police, and security forces could still improve; sectarian violence is declining; and so on. This illustrates how hopes derived from misplaced patriotism and nurtured by clever propaganda can survive unnumbered disappointments, broken promises, and wrong predictions."
The Times, Oct. 10, 2007... for the full article click here

"The prevailing orthodoxy in rich countries is a variant of Micawberism. It is the faith that something will turn up, that rapid economic development will produce a demographic transition in which the population problems of developing countries solve themselves."
The Guardian, Sept. 21, 1999 ... for the full article click here

Here is my own...
Pardon my sesquipedalian ramblings and self-indulgent rodomontade, I blog buoyed by the unbridled Micawberism that I shall not pique my readers and suffer defenestration at their hands - atleast I am not guilty of Dickensian tenebrosity!