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FONDNESS
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I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
A quality proceeding from feelings of affection or love
Synonyms:
affectionateness; fondness; lovingness; warmth
Classified under:
Nouns denoting attributes of people and objects
Hypernyms ("fondness" is a kind of...):
emotionalism; emotionality (emotional nature or quality)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "fondness"):
tenderness (a tendency to express warm and affectionate feeling)
uxoriousness (foolish fondness for or excessive submissiveness to one's wife)
Derivation:
fond (extravagantly or foolishly loving and indulgent)
Sense 2
Meaning:
A predisposition to like something
Example:
she had dismissed him quite brutally, relegating him to the status of a passing fancy, or less
Synonyms:
fancy; fondness; partiality
Classified under:
Nouns denoting feelings and emotions
Hypernyms ("fondness" is a kind of...):
liking (a feeling of pleasure and enjoyment)
Derivation:
fond ((followed by 'of' or 'to') having a strong preference or liking for)
Sense 3
Meaning:
A positive feeling of liking
Example:
the warmness of his welcome made us feel right at home
Synonyms:
affection; affectionateness; fondness; heart; philia; tenderness; warmheartedness; warmness
Classified under:
Nouns denoting feelings and emotions
Hypernyms ("fondness" is a kind of...):
feeling (the experiencing of affective and emotional states)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "fondness"):
attachment; fond regard (a feeling of affection for a person or an institution)
protectiveness (a feeling of protective affection)
regard; respect (a feeling of friendship and esteem)
soft spot (a sentimental affection)
Derivation:
fond (having or displaying warmth or affection)
Context examples:
To the theatre accordingly they all went; no Tilneys appeared to plague or please her; she feared that, amongst the many perfections of the family, a fondness for plays was not to be ranked; but perhaps it was because they were habituated to the finer performances of the London stage, which she knew, on Isabella's authority, rendered everything else of the kind quite horrid.
(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)
This was a prospect to be dwelt on with a fondness that could be but half acknowledged.
(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)
Nature seemed to me benign and good; I thought she loved me, outcast as I was; and I, who from man could anticipate only mistrust, rejection, insult, clung to her with filial fondness.
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
He had a fatherly, benignant way of showing his fondness for her, which seemed in itself to express a good man.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
Yet he betrayed a democratic fondness for Wagner, and the "Tannhauser" overture, when she had given him the clew to it, claimed him as nothing else she played.
(Martin Eden, by Jack London)
He was a married man, with only one living child, a girl, about Jane's age: and Jane became their guest, paying them long visits and growing a favourite with all; and before she was nine years old, his daughter's great fondness for her, and his own wish of being a real friend, united to produce an offer from Colonel Campbell of undertaking the whole charge of her education.
(Emma, by Jane Austen)
But the violation of marriage, or any other unchastity, was never heard of; and the married pair pass their lives with the same friendship and mutual benevolence, that they bear to all others of the same species who come in their way, without jealousy, fondness, quarrelling, or discontent.
(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)
There was a show of gratitude and worship in his attachment to my mother, differing wholly from the doting fondness of age, for it was inspired by reverence for her virtues and a desire to be the means of, in some degree, recompensing her for the sorrows she had endured, but which gave inexpressible grace to his behaviour to her.
(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)
He knew her to be clever, to have a quick apprehension as well as good sense, and a fondness for reading, which, properly directed, must be an education in itself.
(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)
I had the means of an excellent education placed within my reach; a fondness for some of my studies, and a desire to excel in all, together with a great delight in pleasing my teachers, especially such as I loved, urged me on: I availed myself fully of the advantages offered me.
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
