Erewhonian

English

Etymology

Erewhon +‎ -ian: the country's name is an approximate reversal of nowhere, from the novel Erewhon (1872) by Samuel Butler.

Adjective

Erewhonian (comparative more Erewhonian, superlative most Erewhonian)

1. Of or pertaining to the fictional land of Erewhon.
   • 1969, Miriam Strauss Weiss, A Lively Corpse, page 334:

     This seems to be the customary Erewhonian approach to a problem, this time the problem of the incorporeality of God.

   • 1974, Guy Davenport, Tatlin!:

     The traveller was in Erewhonian clothes to keep him inconspicuous, a conical felt hat with owl feather, yellow tabard, tasselled perizoma, belled sandals, and umbrella.

   • 2003, Farhat Iftekharuddin, Joseph Boyden, Postmodern Approaches to the Short Story, page 139:

     The four chapters of Davenport's work generally follow the same scheme. Adriaan calls section one "An Erewhonian Sketchbook" and uses a Napoleonic rather than a Gregorian calendar redesignating the months Messidor (July), Thermidor (August), and Fructidor (September).

   • 2008, H. L. A. Hart, Punishment and Responsibility: Essays in the Philosophy of Law, page 52:

     Those opposed to the Erewhonian programme are apt to object that it disregards moral guilt as a necessary condition of a just punishment and thus leads to a condition in which any person may be sacrificed to the welfare of society.

   • 2015, Sarah C Alexander, Victorian Literature and the Physics of the Imponderable, page 91:

     The Erewhonian conflation of mechanical energy and capitalist value extends to their attitude toward machinery.

Noun

Erewhonian (plural Erewhonians)

1. An inhabitant of the fictional land of Erewhon.
   • 2004, Laraine Anne Barker, The Obsidian Quest, page 101:

     I've never heard of him. What sort of name is that for an Erewhonian?

   • 2009, Alexander Raju, The Haunted Man: A Novel, page 18:

     If so, my own history itself is the history of an average Erewhonian!

   • 2017, William Shurtleff, Akiko Aoyagi, History of Macrobiotics (1715-2017):

     If an Erewhonian plays his role as a martyr with a smile, it is through metaphysical agility.