Novelist
nounA person who writes novels, that is, long works of prose fiction.
How to spell novelist
8 letters · 3 syllables
How to pronounce novelist
Say the part in capitals loudest.
What does novelist mean?
- nounA person who writes novels, that is, long works of prose fiction.
Novelist in a sentence
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The novelist spent three years drafting her debut book.
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As a successful novelist, he earned royalties from a dozen titles.
Where does novelist come from?
Language of origin: Latin
This word is built on 'novel', the name for a long work of prose fiction, and the agent suffix '-ist', meaning 'a person who does or makes something'. 'Novel' itself traces back through the Italian 'novella', a fresh little tale of news or gossip, to the Latin 'novellus', meaning 'new' or 'young', a diminutive of 'novus' 'new'. The idea was that such a story told something new, and the same Latin 'novus' survives in everyday relatives like 'novelty', 'novice', and 'innovate'. English settled on 'novelist' in the seventeenth century to name a writer of these new-style fictional narratives, just as the modern long-form novel was taking shape. The spelling trap lives in the unstressed middle: the schwa before the 'l' is easy to drop, leaving the wrong 'novlist'.
How the word is built
- novel (a long fictional narrative, from Latin novellus: new)
- -ist (one who does or makes)
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