We’re hugely dependent on language to express how we really feel,
and yet words often feel curiously vague or frustratingly inaccurate
There are lots of moods, needs and feelings that our own language
has not yet properly pinned down. The perfect word - even if it
comes from abroad - helps us explain ourselves to other people,
and its existence quietly reassures us (and everyone else) that a
state of mind is not really rare, just rarely spoken of
This set of cards define some of our favourite words from the
world’s languages and married them up with complementary
images to create cards that bring some of our most important
feelings into focus. We’ve created them to prompt greater reflection
about the nature of language and the emotions
Example Cards
- DUENDE (Spanish): A heightened sense of emotion created by a
moving piece of art
- FORELSKET (Norwegian): The euphoric feeling at the beginning
of love. We can’t believe someone so perfect has wandered into
our lives. They enhance and complete us. We might report: ‘I was
overpowered by forelsket as our fingers interlaced…’
- YŪGEN (Japanese): Gives a name to a mood in which one feels
that the universe as a whole possesses a mysterious and elusive
beauty. Moonlight, snow on distant mountains, birds flying very high
in the evening sky, and watching the sun rise over the ocean all
feed this sensibility
We’ve designed these cards to reflect the excitement we find in
encountering and old photograph or an object in a flea market or
antique stall, one that feels familiar yet foreign and is thus infinitely
evocative
How to Use the Cards
You might…
- Turn to these cards to find a word that speaks most powerfully to
your mood
- Sort through and select a card to send to a friend as a memento
of a particular feeling you associate with them
- Play a game with your partner by taking it in turns to remember a
time you may have felt or known the untranslatable word to be most true
More Tools for Expanding Horizons
Card Set: Eastern Philosophy – A set of cards from The School of
Life
Book: How to Travel – A book from The School of Life Press
Article: Why Germans Can Say Things No One Else Can – An
article from our blog, The Book of Life
20 cards in box
and yet words often feel curiously vague or frustratingly inaccurate
There are lots of moods, needs and feelings that our own language
has not yet properly pinned down. The perfect word - even if it
comes from abroad - helps us explain ourselves to other people,
and its existence quietly reassures us (and everyone else) that a
state of mind is not really rare, just rarely spoken of
This set of cards define some of our favourite words from the
world’s languages and married them up with complementary
images to create cards that bring some of our most important
feelings into focus. We’ve created them to prompt greater reflection
about the nature of language and the emotions
Example Cards
- DUENDE (Spanish): A heightened sense of emotion created by a
moving piece of art
- FORELSKET (Norwegian): The euphoric feeling at the beginning
of love. We can’t believe someone so perfect has wandered into
our lives. They enhance and complete us. We might report: ‘I was
overpowered by forelsket as our fingers interlaced…’
- YŪGEN (Japanese): Gives a name to a mood in which one feels
that the universe as a whole possesses a mysterious and elusive
beauty. Moonlight, snow on distant mountains, birds flying very high
in the evening sky, and watching the sun rise over the ocean all
feed this sensibility
We’ve designed these cards to reflect the excitement we find in
encountering and old photograph or an object in a flea market or
antique stall, one that feels familiar yet foreign and is thus infinitely
evocative
How to Use the Cards
You might…
- Turn to these cards to find a word that speaks most powerfully to
your mood
- Sort through and select a card to send to a friend as a memento
of a particular feeling you associate with them
- Play a game with your partner by taking it in turns to remember a
time you may have felt or known the untranslatable word to be most true
More Tools for Expanding Horizons
Card Set: Eastern Philosophy – A set of cards from The School of
Life
Book: How to Travel – A book from The School of Life Press
Article: Why Germans Can Say Things No One Else Can – An
article from our blog, The Book of Life
20 cards in box