I feel like whenever I see the word “bespectacled” in writing, it is always used in a negative way, without exception. It’s always “a fat, bald, bespectacled man” or something, usually describing a boss, principal, or some other douchebag authority figure or some nerd.
I don’t think I’ve ever read anything like, “tall, handsome, bespectacled man” or anything using that term in a positive context. Ever.
Do you agree?
I don’t get that at all. The only connotation I get is that it’s usually an older person.
It could be used to denote someone who is studious, or a hot, secretary, librarian type woman:
“She was tall and stacked, with her hair pulled back into a taut bun. Her breasts strained the lines of her crisp white blouse. Her bespectacled eyes smoldered behind her thick lenses, and I knew that she would soon be mine.”
Have to disagree though I can’t find a proper cite to point to. I feel it has no connotation other than “person who wears glasses.”
No. I just think of it as meaning that the person wears glasses.
This is what I think as well.
Dr Watson is generally considered to be older, plump, and bespectacled. He’s definitely a positive image.
I suspect that in oldentimes, being older, bald, and overweight was considered to be the everyman, not some negative stereotype. This was before rogaine, low-carb diets, and contact lenses.
I just want to subscribe to the thread in case there’s more of this!
Which Dr Watson are you referring to? The one in the Sherlock Holmes stories started out as a thin war veteran of about 30. Most of the stories take place before he’s fifty. He is never at any time in any story depicted as bespectacled. Or plump, except in the ludicrous “His Last Bow.”
Bespectacled can have a negative connotation, sort of a polite, formal way of calling someone “four-eyes,” a slang phrase that’s about completely dead. Bespectacled is also mostly obsolete, but I agree with the OP that it was often used as a pejorative.
To me, “bespectacled” evokes Burgess Meredith in TZ’s “Time Enough at Last” . . . or perhaps Mrs. Claus.
The first thing I thought of was “bespectacled Red Sox center fielder Dom DiMaggio”.
The connotation can’t be too negative seeing as he hit close to .300 for his career and was an All-Star on multiple occasions.
I don’t get any sense of negative or positive connotation from the word bespectacled itself. To me, it’s completely neutral, with no shade of meaning one way or another beyond “one who wears glasses.” Now, depending on the context, the characterization of one wearing glasses may be positive or negative, but I don’t think there’s any psychological weight to the word itself.
I’m referring to the one that everyone knows (which is agreed, at a bit of odds with the description in the books. But I think that Hollywood has won the battle just as eternally as it has set the image of Frankenstein over the original novel and Darcula’s accent.)
This.
Same here. Never seemed negative to me.
Since the OP is more of a poll, let’s move this to IMHO.
samclem Moderator, General Questions
Put me in the crowd that says it just means that he or she wears glasses.
Hm, I guess he doesn’t usually have glasses, but otherwise I’d say that (outside of Jude Law), the older, overweight thing stands.
