First, I’d like to thank everyone who contributed in the comments to my definition of “ordeal.” Now, more fun with the Oxford English Dictionary!…

I won’t bore you will the complete definition of the word “woe,” but I will bore you with a partial definition and a few excerpts of English poetry that contain my personal favorite uses of the word “woe.” Consider this a particularly self-serving blog post. My apologies.

B. n. 1. a. A condition of misery, affliction, or distress; misfortune, trouble; grievous or sorrowful state. poet. or rhet. Freq. in phr. tale of woe, a narrative of (one’s) misfortunes. Now usu. joc.

Shakespeare, from Romeo and Juliet, Act V, Scene iii:

“A glooming peace this morning with it
brings,
The sun, for sorrow, will not show its head.
Go hence to have more talk of these sad things;
Some shall be pardon’d, and some punished:
For never was a story of more woe
Than this of Juliet and her Romeo.”

Coleridge, from Genevieve:

“Maid of my Love, sweet Genevieve!
In Beauty’s light you glide along:
Your eye is like the star of eve,
And sweet your Voice, as Seraph’s song.
Yet not your heavenly Beauty gives
This heart with passion soft to glow:
Within your soul a Voice there lives!
It bids you hear the tale of Woe.”

Byron, from The Giaour:

“And thou wilt bless thee from the rage
Of passions fierce and uncontroll’d,
Such as thy penitents unfold,
Whose secret sins and sorrows rest
Within thy pure and pitying breast.
My days, though few, have pass’d below
In much of joy, but more of woe;”

Shelley, from Prometheus Unbound, Act I, Scene i:

“Ah woe!
Ah woe! Alas! pain, pain ever, for ever!
I close my tearless eyes, but see more clear
Thy works within my woe-illumèd mind,
Thou subtle tyrant! Peace is in the grave.
The grave hides all things beautiful and good:
I am a God and cannot find it there,
Nor would I seek it: for, though dread revenge,
This is defeat, fierce king, not victory.
The sights with which thou torturest gird my soul
With new endurance, till the hour arrives
When they shall be no types of things which are.”

OK, that’s enough of that. For my next post, I plan on returning to my own personal tales of woe; however, I am also toying with the idea of presenting a summarization of sorts of the ultimate tale of woe: The Book of Job (King James Version).

Good night.

To begin with a terribly clichéd opening statement, the Oxford English Dictionary defines “ordeal” in the following way:

2. Anything which acts as a test, or severely tests character or endurance. Hence more generally: a painful, trying, or unhappy experience, esp. a protracted one.

This, I think, is a fair definition. But to truly understand this word, one should also look at its original definition:

1. Law. A practice of trial in which an accused person is subjected to a test, usually involving physical pain or danger, overcoming of which is taken as divine proof of innocence (freq. in ordeal by fire, etc.); (also) the right or prerogative of jurisdiction in a trial of this kind, together with the fees and profits thence accruing.

Yikes. Now we’re getting somewhere.

Now, you may be wondering why I am so interested in the definition of ordeal. Well, if we look at the first definition I mentioned, we see that, generally, an ordeal is a trying or unhappy experience. This, I feel, is close if not interchangeable with a “tale of woe.” But, I have other reasons for dedicating this entry to ordeal. I would personally like to extend the general definition of ordeal into a more specific context.

I think that anything that takes over five hours to complete should be automatically considered an ordeal. A plane trip, a car ride, an operation. Anything five hours or more = ordeal.

Furthermore, anything that normally takes a modest amount of time (certainly less than five hours) that, for some reason, takes a longer amount of time. To use a personal example, once I took my car to the car wash. This automated car wash usually only took five minutes of my time, but one day the car washer’s rollers stopped working in media res, and I was left sitting in my sudsy car for longer than the normal five minutes. In fact, it wasn’t until much later that day that I finally had a clean and dry car. Thus, an ordeal.

Finally, I think that the following should also be considered ordeals: trips to the DMV, trips to the dentist, delays at the airport, and the changing of tires. One caveat, however: if any of these things takes an inordinately short amount of time, it may not be considered an ordeal. For example: Once I went to the dentist and my appointment was cancelled. Why? Because my dental hygentist informed me that she had lost vision in her right eye. Ordeal averted!

So, in closing, ordeals no matter what the definition, usually suck. Please feel free to add any of your own definitions in the comments.