ruralize

English

Alternative forms

• ruralise

Etymology

rural +‎ -ize

Verb

ruralize (third-person singular simple present ruralizes, present participle ruralizing, simple past and past participle ruralized)

1. (transitive) To make rural; to give a rural character to (something or someone).
   • 1799, William Wordsworth, The Prelude‎^[1], London: Moxon, published 1850, Book 1, Introduction, p. 7:

     the curling cloud / Of city smoke, by distance ruralised

   • 1883, Robert Louis Stevenson, chapter 2, in The Silverado Squatters‎^[2], Boston: Roberts Brothers, pages 40–41:

     This tardy favorite of fortune […] thoroughly ruralized from head to foot, proceeded to escort us up the hill behind his house.

   • 1890, Henry James, chapter 2, in The Tragic Muse‎^[3], volume 2, London: Macmillan, page 23:

     […] the quiet bachelor house had its best rooms on the big garden, which seemed to advance into them through their wide windows and ruralize their dullness.

   • 2007 March 1, Michael Slackman, “In Arab Hub, the Poor Are Left to Their Fate”, in New York Times‎^[4]:

     But it is also a collection of villages, a ruralized metropolis where people live by their wits and devices, cut off from the authorities, the law and often each other.

2. (intransitive) To become rural; to take up residence or spend time in the country.

   Synonym: rusticate

   • c. 1822, Charles Lamb, undated letter to John Howard Payne in The Letter of Charles Lamb, 1814-1825, Boston: The Bibliophile Society, Volume 4, pp. 197-198,^[5]

     I shall certainly attend your Farce, if in town; but as ’t is possible I shall ruralize this week, I will have no orders of you till next week.

   • 1824, Mary Russell Mitford, “Rosedale and Its Tenants”, in The Monthly Magazine‎^[6], volume 11, page 525:

     […] Letitia, who, except one jaunt to Margate, had never been out of the sound of Bow-bells, that she might ruralise after the fashion of the poets, sit under trees, and gather roses all day long;

   • 1840, Leigh Hunt, “My Books”, in The Seer‎^[7], London: Moxon, page 51:

     […] the passage which I recollect with the greatest pleasure in Cicero, is where he says that books delight us at home, and are no impediment abroad; travel with us, ruralise with us.

   • 1872, Mark Twain, chapter 67, in Roughing It‎^[8], Hartford, CT: American Publiching Company, page 486:

     Then there is his Excellency the “royal Chamberlain”—a sinecure, for his majesty dresses himself with his own hands, except when he is ruralizing at Waikiki and then he requires no dressing.

Derived terms

• ruralization