gestalt

Estimated CEFR level: C2 — Proficiency

Estimated from word frequency; not an official CEFR classification.

Definition

noun a configuration or pattern of elements so unified as a whole that it cannot be described merely as a sum of its parts

Borrowed from German Gestalt (“shape, figure, form”).

The underlying gestalt for their very existence. — Terminal Compromise, Winn Schwartau
But listen: Let us imagine a rising generation with this undauntedness of vision, with this heroic impulse towards the prodigious, let us imagine the bold step of these dragon-slayers, the proud daring with which they turn their backs on all the effeminate doctrines of optimism, in order "to live resolutely" in the Whole and in the Full: would it not be necessary for the tragic man of this culture, with his self-discipline to earnestness and terror, to desire a new art, the art of metaphysical comfort, tragedy as the Helena belonging to him, and that he should exclaim with Faust: "Und sollt ich nicht, sehnsüchtigster Gewalt, In's Leben ziehn die einzigste Gestalt? — The Birth of Tragedy; or, Hellenism and Pessimism, Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

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