different between humorist vs comedian

English

Alternative forms

• humourist

Etymology

From humor +? -ist.

Noun

humorist (plural humorists)

1. (medicine, now rare, historical) Someone who believes that health and temperament are determined by bodily humours; a humoralist. [from 16th c.]
2. (obsolete) Someone subject to whims or fancies; an eccentric. [16th–19th c.]
   • 1751, Tobias Smollett, The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, vol. III, ch. 88:

     She and the duke used to rally me upon my fondness for lord W—m, who was a sort of an humourist, and apt to be in a pet, in which case he would leave the company, and go to bed by seven o'clock in the evening.

   • 1792, James Boswell, in Danziger & Brady (eds.), Boswell: The Great Biographer (Journals 1789–1795), Yale 1989, p. 175:

     I called on him and found him a contemporary of Beauclerk and Langton at Trinity College, Oxford, and a man of reading and animation, but a kind of humourist.

3. A humorous or witty person, especially someone skilled in humorous writing or performance. [from 17th c.]
4. One who studies or portrays the humours of people.

Coordinate terms

• comedian / comedienne
• comic
• clown
• jester

Translations

Romanian

Noun

humorist m (plural humori?ti, feminine equivalent humorist?)

1. Alternative spelling of umorist.

English

Etymology

comedy +? -ian. From Middle French comédien, from comédie (“comedy”).

Pronunciation

• (US) IPA^(key): /k??mi?di.?n/

Noun

comedian (plural comedians) (feminine: comedienne)

1. An entertainer who performs in a humorous manner, especially by telling jokes.

   Synonym: comic

2. (by extension) Any person who is humorous or amusing, either characteristically or on a particular occasion.

   Synonyms: card, cutup, gagster, joker, wag, wit

3. (dated) A person who performs in theatrical plays.

   Synonyms: actor, player, thespian

   • c. 1606, William Shakespeare, Antony and Cleopatra, Act V, Scene 2,^[1]

     […] the quick comedians

     Extemporally will stage us, and present

     Our Alexandrian revels;

   • 1714, Susanna Centlivre, The Wonder, London: E. Curll and A. Bettesworth, Preface,^[2]

     I Don’t pretend to write a Preface, either to point out the Beauties, or to excuse the Errors, a judicious Reader may possibly discover in the following Scenes, but to give those excellent Comedians their Due, to whom, in some Measure the best Dramatick Writers are oblig’d.

   • 1755, George Colman, The Connaisseur, London: R. Baldwin, Volume 1, p. 1,^[3]

     When a Comedian, celebrated for his excellence in the part of Shylock, first undertook that character, he made daily visits to the center of business, the ’Change, and the adjacent Coffee-houses; that by a frequent intercourse and conversation with “the unforeskinn’d race,” he might habituate himself to their air and deportment.

   • 1848, William Makepeace Thackeray, Vanity Fair, Chapter 51,^[4]

     Becky, the nightingale, took the flowers which he threw to her and pressed them to her heart with the air of a consummate comedian.

4. (obsolete) A writer of comedies.
   • 1644, John Milton, Areopagitica, London, p. 5,^[5]

     Neither is it recorded that the writings of those old Comedians were supprest, though the acting of them were forbid;

   • 1783, Hugh Blair, Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles Lettres, London: Whitestone et al., Volume 3, Lecture 47, p. 377,^[6]

     […] the Dramatic Author, in whom the French glory most, and whom they justly place at the head of all their Comedians, is, the famous Moliere.

Synonyms

• funnyman/funnywoman

Hypernyms

• (male comedian): comedian (male and female)

Hyponyms

• (comedian, male and female): comedian (male), comedienne (female)

See also

• tragedian

Translations

Anagrams

• daemonic, demoniac, dæmonic, midocean

Romanian

Etymology

From French comédien.

Noun

comedian m (plural comedieni)

1. comedian

Declension