Word of the Day

: August 13, 2021

kvell

verb KVEL

What It Means

Kvell is from Yiddish and means "to be extraordinarily proud."

// The parents kvelled over their daughter's dance solo.

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kvell in Context

"[Norman Lear] had no reason to think he would be a comedy icon with some 120 million people watching his shows each week. How his Russian-born Jewish grandparents would have kvelled." — Sybil Adelman Sage, The Forward, 17 Sep. 2020

Did You Know?

Kvell comes from Yiddish kveln, meaning "to be delighted," which, in turn, comes from the Middle High German word quellen, meaning "to well, gush, or swell." Yiddish has been a wellspring of creativity for English, giving us such delightful words as meister ("one who is knowledgeable about something"), maven ("expert"), and shtick ("one's special activity"), just to name a few. The date for the appearance of kvell in the English language is tricky to pinpoint exactly. The earliest known printed evidence for the word in an English source is found in a 1952 handbook of Jewish words and expressions.