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Definition of "classicist" []

  • One versed in the classics; a classical scholar. (noun)
  • An adherent of classicism. (noun)
  • An advocate of the study of ancient Greek and Latin. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Use "classicist" in a sentence
  • "First of all Jonson was a classicist, that is, he believed in restraint and precedent in art in opposition to the prevalent ungoverned and irresponsible Renaissance spirit."
  • "His engagement with classicism preceded not only the Armistice but the start of the war in 1914 (if he ever really disengaged) and was far more motivated by his disgust with the popularizing of Cubism by Albert Gleizes and Jean Metzinger (the latter a featured "classicist" in the exhibition) than by any social or political goals."
  • "Even the great, "literary literary" T.S. Eliot explicitly coupled his taste in literature ( "classicist") with a politics ( "royalist") and a religion ( "Anglo-Catholicism")."