mis lit
n.— «Nowadays, there is a mania for memoirs, and in fact there are so many of them that they have come to be called in some quarters “mis lit” (misery literature).» —“Larry McMurtry on Cormac, Heaven’s Gate, and his favorite librarian” by Deanne Stillman LA Observed: Native Intelligence May 1, 2008. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
Many of us struggled with the Old English poem “Beowulf” in high school. But what if you could actually hear “Beowulf” in the English of today? There’s a new translation by Maria Dahvana Headley that uses contemporary...
In the 15th century, the word respair meant “to have hope again.” Although this word fell out of use, it’s among dozens collected in a new book of soothing vocabulary for troubled times. Plus, baseball slang: If a batter...