Beautiful German Words
Weltschmerz
VELT-shmerts
The tender ache of feeling the whole world’s sadness at once.
What it means
Weltschmerz — “world-pain” — is a wistful melancholy about the state of the world, and the gap between how things are and how they could be. Coined by the Romantic writers, it is grander and gentler than ordinary sadness.
It is what you feel scrolling grim headlines, or on a grey Sunday when everything seems a little broken. Not depression — more a poetic, aching awareness of the world.
In real sentences
Ihn überkam ein tiefer Weltschmerz.
A deep world-weariness came over him.
A deep world-weariness came over him.
Das ist typischer Weltschmerz.
That’s classic world-weariness.
That’s classic world-weariness.
Word family
Welt (world) + Schmerz (pain). Schmerz also gives Kopfschmerz (headache) and the yearning Sehnsucht — a deep, aching longing.
Want to drop words like this naturally into conversation? Practise with a friendly native tutor on italki.
Find a tutor on italki →