vainglory
/veɪnˈɡlɔːri
/noun [mass noun] literary
Excessive pride in oneself or one’s achievements; excessive vanity: his vainglory put the Republic at risk...
- Yet the book is a heavy volume of historic narcissism - a magnum opus of upper-class vainglory and scrupulous evasion.
- At the age of seventeen, brimming with optimism and ruled by vainglory, Victor leaves his native Switzerland to attend college.
- She was ambitious to the point of vainglory.
Derivatives
vaingloriously
- Each week another dire e-commerce venture sinks vaingloriously beneath the mire.
- But are they really any more vaingloriously ambitious than those constructed by the landed aristocracy of the 18th century, Victorian mill-owners, or Citizen Kane himself?
- If the city only thinks of its own image, it is actually behaving vaingloriously.
vaingloriousness
- In court papers and interviews, the two lawyers have further accused each other of vaingloriousness.
- If I may say so, lording your success over me by boasting that you told me so is truly the height of vaingloriousness, considering that when we last spoke I remember offering only encouragement.
- I was studying the books of eloquence; for in eloquence it was my ambition to shine, all from a damnable vaingloriousness and for the satisfaction of human vanity.
Origin
Middle English: suggested by Old French vaine gloire, Latin vana gloria.