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pastness

American  
[past-nis] / ˈpæst nɪs /

noun

  1. the state or fact of being past.


Etymology

Origin of pastness

First recorded in 1820–30; past + -ness

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

This Is the process whereby pain of the past in its pastness May be converted into the future tense.

From Salon

Eliot put it nearly a century ago, the historical sense “involves a perception, not only of the pastness of the past, but of its presence.”

From Los Angeles Times

Eliot called a sense “not only of the pastness of the past, but of its presence.”

From Washington Post

Last June, when its fourth season concluded, “The Americans” was a series about the pastness of the past.

From The New Yorker

Your discussion of that passage is brilliant, you extrapolate much from it about “the culmination of a theory of pastness” and also how it describes succinctly Bellow’s “lastingness.”

From Los Angeles Times