abstainer en · NOUN
Pronunciation
Etymology
From Middle English absteyner, equivalent to abstain + -er.
Meanings
-
One who abstains; especially, one who abstains from something, such as the use of alcohol or drugs, or one who abstains for religious reasons; one who practices self-denial.
He was a total abstainer and a nonsmoker, had no recreations except a daily hour in the gymnasium, and had taken a vow of celibacy, believing marriage and the care of a family to be incompatible with a twenty-four-hour-a-day devotion to duty.
1949, George Orwell, chapter 4, in Nineteen Eighty-Four:To one of my very nervous patients, who was an abstainer, whose fancy was fixed on his mother, and who repeatedly dreamed of climbing stairs accompanied by his mother, I once remarked that moderate masturbation would be less harmful to him than enforced abstinence.
1920, Sigmund Freud, chapter V, in M. D. Eder, transl., Dream Psychology: Psychoanalysis for Beginners, New York: The James A. McCann Company:'Never himself touches a drop of the stuff, you understand. Having been an abstainer since the age of seven or something. A clerky figure even as a child.'
1990, William Trevor, “Family Sins”, in The Collected Stories, New York: Viking, published 1992, page 1105:
Forms
| Spelling | Features | Labels | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| abstainers | Number=Plur | lexicographic |
Deriveds
Synonyms
Translations (15)
es abstemio (one who abstains) · pl abstynent (one who abstains) · no avholdsmann (one who abstains) · sh trezvènjāk (one who abstains) · sh апстинент (one who abstains) · id golongan putih (one who abstains) · fi pidättäytyjä (one who abstains) · bg въздържател (one who abstains) · mk тре́звеник (one who abstains) · sv asket (one who abstains) · pl abstynentka (one who abstains) · mi wainamu (one who abstains) · mk апстине́нт (one who abstains) · nl onthouder (one who abstains) · sh apstinent (one who abstains)