suscitability

English

Etymology

From suscitate +‎ -ability.

Noun

suscitability (uncountable)

1. (rare) The capability of being suscitated; excitability.
   • 1610 (first performance), Ben[jamin] Jonson, The Alchemist, London: […] Thomas Snodham, for Walter Burre, and are to be sold by Iohn Stepneth, […], published 1612, →OCLC; reprinted Menston, Yorkshire: The Scolar Press, 1970, →OCLC, Act II, scene v:

     Svb. This's Heathen Greek, to you? And, what's your Mercury?
     Fac. A very Fugitiue, he will be gone, Sir.
     Svb. How know you him? Fac. By his viſcoſitie,
     His oleoſitie, and his ſuſcitabilitie.

   • 1917, Detroit Medical Journal, volume 18, page 71:

     Neither suscitability of the still-born infant or the resuscitability of the seemingly dead adult require proof to substantiate their possibility. With life extinguished neither operation has any concern, […]

   • 1949 January 10, Frank Brookhouser, “It's Happening Here”, in The Philadelphia Inquirer, volume 240, number 10, page 21:

     One reader writes to say that students of English “will smile at your suscitability over ‘argy-bargy,’ quite common in the piquant argot of Scotland and North England.” We apologize for our suscitability.

   • 2002, Jill Mackavey, “Synergizing Internal and External Actin”, in Nicole Potter, editor, Movement for Actors, New York, NY: Allworth Press, →ISBN, page 206:

     I particularly like the word “suscitate” in connection with teaching and directing. The most fundamental aspect of human movement, breath, is carried on the tongue of suscitate. […] The students’ job is to cultivate “suscitability”—the ability to be stirred awake—and to commit fully to their formation.

References

• “suscitability”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.