ungood

See also: ++ungood

English

Etymology

From Middle English ungod, from Old English ungōd, equivalent to un- +‎ good. Popularised by its appearance in Newspeak, a fictional language coined in Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949), a dystopian novel by George Orwell.

Pronunciation

  • (UK) IPA(key): /ˌʌnˈɡʊd/

Adjective

ungood (comparative more ungood, superlative most ungood)

  1. not good; bad
    • 1660, George Swinnock, “The Beauty of Magistracy: An Exposition of Psalm LXXXII.”, in Works‎, volume IV, published 1868, The Beauty of Magistracy, page 236:
      An unjust judge, as one well observes, is a cold fire, a dark sun, a dry sea, a mare mortuum, an ungood god, contradictio in adjecto, monsters, not men, much less gods.
    • 1947 March 8, “Dirty Work at the X-Roads?”, in Billboard‎, volume 59 No. 11, number March 15, 1947, Nielsen Business Media, Inc., ISSN 0006-2510, page 50:
      Now to make a short story shorter, we all know this is very ungood for a new motor and I do not want to thank the person or persons who unwittingly left their fingerprints, of which I have photostatic copies, so that might detect the presence of graphite before staring the motor.
    • 1988, Clarice Lispector, The Passion According to G.H.‎, →ISBN, page 5:
      What I was before wasn't good for me. But it was from that ungood that I put together something better: I had put together hope. From my own ungood I had created a future good.
    • 2008, Rodney Davis, The Revelation Voyage‎, →ISBN, page 14:
      “Way ungood guys, way ungood.”
    • 2010 June 6, "Tim", “Re:McDonald's Ad Promotes Teenage Homosexuality”, in alt.socieity.liberalism, Usenet‎:
      And remember! Islam is ungood; atheism, file sharing, civil liberties and homosexuality are doubleplusungood.
    • 2010, Timothy M. Dale, Joseph J. Foy, Kate Mulgrew, quoting Jon Stewart, “The Daily Show and the Politics of Truth”, in Homer Simpson Marches on Washington: Dissent Through American Popular Culture‎, →ISBN, Popular Culture as Public Space, page 48:
      This man is very, very ungood.

Usage notes

  • Although the intensified word used in Orwell's Newspeak is plus-ungood, this is not used in English. The base term (positive) is significantly rarer than the most intensified term double-plus-ungood.
  • The prescribed comparative and superlative forms in Newspeak are ungooder and ungoodest (George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four, "Appendix: The Principles of Newspeak").

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