Here at Filling My Patch of Sky, words are like dear friends. And I’ve just discovered a few new ones within the pages of Jon Krakauer’s Into the Wild—words that I had not encountered before (at least, not that I remember!).
Let me introduce you:
contumacious | adjective | 1583
stubbornly disobedient : rebellious
found on page 11: “Thompson, Samel, and Swanson, however, are contumacious Alaskans with special fondness for driving motor vehicles where motor vehicles aren’t really designed to be driven.”
opprobrium | noun | Latin, 1656
1: something that brings disgrace
2 a: public disgrace or ill fame that follows from conduct considered grossly wrong or vicious | 2 b: contempt, reproach
found on page 70: “The article about McCandless in Outside generated a large volume of mail, and not a few of the letters heaped opprobrium on McCandless . . .”
eremite | noun | Middle English,13th century
hermit; especially : a religious recluse
found on page 73: “Edward Hoagland observed that Alaska is ‘not the best site in the world for eremitic experiments or peace-love theatrics.'”
Now that you’ve been introduced, be sure to invite them out once in a while.
For more word-related discoveries, visit wordlily.
erinstraza.wordpress.com 
Ooh, eremite is a good word!
Thanks for playing along!
wordlily—that’s my favorite of the bunch. (But don’t tell contumacious or opprobrium. I wouldn’t want them to feel slighted.) —es
I didn’t know contumacious – but I like how it sounds. I might even remember this one!
Oppobrium looks like one of those words I write down every single time I ever encounter it. The defn just won’t stick. I swear if you look at my lists over the years of words I don’t know, this one and a few others make plenty of appearances.
Care—So true! Some words don’t stick in my brain no matter how often I look them up! And then when I see them anew, I roll my mind’s eye at it, a bit perturbed (as if it’s the word’s fault my brain won’t remember it!). —es