outsider
(aʊtˈsaɪdə(r))
[f. outside n. + -er1.]
1. a. One who is outside any enclosure, barrier, or boundary, material or figurative; esp. one who is outside of or does not belong to a specified company, set, or party, a non-member; hence, one unconnected or unacquainted with a matter, uninitiated into a profession or body having special knowledge, or the like. Also attrib.
| 1800 Jane Austen Lett. (1884) I. 245 There was a whist and a casino table, and six outsiders. 1833 Fonblanque Eng. Under 7 Administ. (1837) II. 354 Those he cannot entertain, the outsiders, ‘without a home to cover them’. 1844 in Marsh Eng. Lang. (1860) 274 [At the Baltimore convention of 1844,..a prominent member energetically protested against all interference with the business of the meeting by] outsiders. [The word, if not absolutely new, was at least new to most of those who read the proceedings..and it was now for the first time employed in a serious way.] 1847 Lit. Gaz. July 499/1 All Irish fights ought to be left, by outsiders who value their own safety, to be fought out by the combatants. 1852 Dickens Bleak Ho. li, He is only an outsider, and is not in the mysteries. a 1860 Lowell Jrnl. (Bartlett), A large number of outsiders have gone to the free-soil convention at Buffalo. 1886 J. K. Jerome Idle Thoughts 31 Outsiders, you know, often see most of the game. 1897 J. McCarthy Gladstone's Life xxvii. 90/2 The outsider class..quarreled with Mr. Gladstone because he was always giving them a surprise. 1912 T. E. Lawrence Let. 10 Feb. (1938) 136 About the Jerablus seals:—I can't give you those, only the five outsiders: the Jerablus ones were bought [etc.]. 1935 Amer. Speech X. 271/2 Outsiders, buyers who ship special kinds of livestock to other markets. 1944 F. Brown in B. W. Aldiss Introd. SF (1964) 69 No one knew who the Outsiders were..or from what far galaxy they came. 1958 Amer. Speech XXXIII. 167 (Australian Cattle Lingo) Outsider,..a stray. 1974 Nat. Geographic Jan. 114/2 The fishermen talked shyly in the presence of an outsider from upalong. (An ‘outsider’ is any off-islander, including even other Canadians.) 1977 Globe & Mail (Toronto) 5 July 8/3 So far, he says, the inquiry has been lucky enough to be seen as a unit, not as two Yukoners—one for whites and one for Indians led by an outsider. |
b. Horse-racing. A horse not included among the ‘favourites’, and against which in betting long odds are laid; one not ‘in the running’; also fig.; transf., a person who fails to gain admission to the ‘ring’; a person who habitually backs outsiders in a race; rank outsider, (a) an outsider at very long odds; (b) a person who is considered socially inferior (cf. sense 1 c below).
| 1836 R. S. Surtees Let. in A. Mathews Mem. Charles Mathews (1839) IV. ix. 185 An unfortunate outsider, called Astracan. 1836 Spirit of Times 5 Mar. 20/1 The Brother to Maria, the Babel colt, and Taishteer, are a shade worse, owing, no doubt, to the money laid out upon Brother to Nell Gwynne. No change amongst the outsiders. 1845 Ibid. 31 May 158 The ‘outsiders’ won ‘smartly’ on both races, and the staunch friends of Fashion, who have backed her ‘all through’, have ‘got hunk’ and a good deal over. 1855 J. R. Planché New Haymarket Spring Meeting in Extravaganzas (1879) V. i. 94 Which are the favourites, and which outsiders? 1857 G. A. Lawrence Guy Livingstone xxv, It was evident he was still the favourite, and that all others were complete ‘outsiders’. 1871 R. A. Proctor Light Sci. (Ser. 1) 288 The success of a rank outsider will be described as ‘a misfortune to backers’. 1874 Burnand My Time xxviii. 273 As an outsider from an unknown stable may falsify all prognostications about a Derby favourite. 1890 Barrère & Leland Dict. Slang II. 170 Rank outsider (common), a vulgar fellow, a cad. From a racing term applied to a horse outside the rank. 1902 Farmer & Henley Slang V. 116/1 Outsider,..(racing), a person who fails to gain admission to the ‘ring’ from pecuniary or other causes. 1908 Magnet I. i. 8/2, I ask you if you ever saw such a rank outsider in all your natural? |
c. A person who is isolated from or does not ‘fit’ into conventional society either through choice or on account of some social, intellectual, etc., reason. (Often deprecating.) spec. In literary criticism: the archetypal artist or intellectual seen as a person isolated from the rest of society. Also attrib.
| 1907 ‘I. Hay’ Pip x. 322 ‘I didn't think you ought to play [golf] with him,’ said Pip coolly. ‘He's an utter outsider.’ 1908 Magnet I. i. 7/1 ‘You rotten outsider!’ said Bulstrode, in tones of concentrated rage. ‘You're not fit to be at a decent school.’ 1913 H. Kephart Our Southern Highlanders xiii. 294 A bastard is a woods-colt or an outsider. 1946 S. Gilbert tr. Camus's L'{Eacu}tranger (title) The Outsider. 1956 C. Wilson Outsider i. 14 Many great artists have none of the characteristics of the Outsider. Shakespeare, Dante, Keats were all apparently normal and socially well-adjusted. 1957 Times Lit. Suppl. 25 Oct. 640/1 His [sc. C. Wilson's] original contribution was simply the Outsider gimmick. 1958 [see down and out adj. phr.]. 1958 J. Raymond England's on Anvil! 40 Like Proust the Jew, Pope the Roman Catholic son of a linen-draper was an outsider. 1959 Times Lit. Suppl. 1 May 261/4 It throws light on two generations of ‘outsider’ philosophers grappling with their own sudden emergence into the world of letters and art. 1963 Spectator 4 Oct. 430/1 The City of Dreadful Night..is Outsider poetry. 1966 C. Sweeney Scurrying Bush xiv. 201, I remember an odd fellow when I was in Nigeria. Bit of an outsider, really, but do anything with snakes. |
2. In literal sense: One whose position is on the outside of some group or series; an outside man.
| 1857 Hughes Tom Brown i. v, Here come two of the bulldogs, bursting through the outsiders [of a football scrummage]; in they go, straight to the heart of the scrummage. 1897 P. Warung Tales Old Regime 84 One day, Phillips was ‘outsider’ on his chain. That is to say, he was working nearest the shaft in a gallery... West was outsider in the adjacent gallery. |
3. An outside jaunting-car.
| 1900 Westm. Gaz. 19 Jan. 10/2 If we are to judge by the figures set out by the Chief Commissioner of the Dublin Police in his latest report, the popularity of the ‘outsider’ is on the wane. In a single year the number of cars has been reduced by sixty-two. |
4. pl. A pair of nippers with semi-tubular jaws, which can be inserted into a keyhole from the outside so as to grasp and turn the key.
| 1875 in Knight Dict. Mech. 1896 Columbus (Ohio) Disp. 15 Jan. 1/8 The burglary must have been well planned. Three of the doors..were opened by means of outsiders. |
Hence outˈsiderdom, outˈsiderhood, the condition or state of being an outsider (in sense 1 c, above); outˈsiderish a., of the nature or character of an outsider; so outˈsiderishness; outˈsiderism, the theory or practice of being an outsider; outˈsiderliness, the quality or fact of being an outsider (in sense 1 c); outˈsiderly a., characteristic of an outsider or of outsiderliness.
| 1956 C. Wilson Outsider viii. 216 He had accepted his ‘Outsider-ishness’, not as a symptom of some strange disease, but as a sign that his healthy soul was being suffocated in a world of trivial, shallow, corrupted fools. 1957 Times Lit. Suppl. 25 Oct. 640/4 That the seeds of outsiderliness are found in us all may well account for Mr. Wilson's success. 1958 Ibid. 28 Mar. 165/3 A final view of Mr Freund..might be that he is a sort of Colin Wilson without a theory of Outsiderdom, searching for the religious viewpoint that will include the complexities of modern science. 1958 Listener 26 June 1070/1 Genuine outsiderhood, as experienced by delinquents, psychotics, alcoholics, unmarried mothers, and a whole host of people who..find themselves the wrong side of the law. Ibid. 10 July 63/3 His ‘outsiderism’ made him enjoy shocking the professional scientists. 1959 Times Lit. Suppl. 23 Jan. 44/1 His account of that heredity is wry, humorous, and outsider-ish. His Jewish ancestry has its roots in Poland and Slovakia. Ibid. 4 Sept. 503/3 The outsiderly novel by Henri Barbusse, L'Enfer, which was the starting point of Mr. Wilson's first book. 1960 Ibid. 8 Apr. 221/1 Poetic abstraction and ‘outsiderish’ philosophical terminology. 1961 Guardian 23 June 9/6 The jigging of today's young is their alternative to ‘outsiderism’. 1961 John o' London's 16 Nov. 548/2 The trouble with Outsiderdom as a philosophy is the squalid assortment of fellow-travellers it attracts. 1962 Times Lit. Suppl. 21 Sept. 710/2 Accompanying such pieces of outsiderly narcissism is a certain amount of fashionable philosophizing. 1966 New Statesman 8 July 61/1 An outsiderly Old Etonian whose rebellion against the ethics of his upbringing has driven him mad. |