isolato

American  

[ahy-suh-ley-toh] / ˌaɪ səˈleɪ toʊ /

noun

isolatoes plural

1. a person who is physically or spiritually isolated from society or out of sympathy with the times.

   In more recent literature, typical heroes are the exile, the expatriate, the resistance fighter, the isolato, the haunted rebel.

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• isolatoes
  plural

Etymology

Origin of isolato

First recorded in 1850–55; from Italian, from Latin insulātus; see insulate

Explanation

If you are a loner who has very little to do with others and has quite different values and ideas from most people, you may be an isolato. You might even be a genius! Isolato is a word borrowed from Italian, where it literally means "isolated." An isolato doesn't have to be unable to cope with the world; they’re just set apart from others because they have a different way of understanding life, and their plans and dreams diverge from the rest of the world’s. A hermit is a type of isolato. Sometimes a genius can be so far in advance of their peers in their thinking that they become an isolato.

Example Sentences

It’s about urban loneliness, including the author’s own, and it takes detours into truly offbeat places, such as the music of that genuine isolato, the otherworldly countertenor Klaus Nomi.

From New York Times • Sep. 24, 2018