Delight (n) – in Online Etymology Dictionary, from the Old French delitier (verb), delit (noun), from Latin delectare, meaning ‘to charm’. The –gh– was added in the 16th century by association with light.

Famously felt by Anne Shirley, Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Maud Montgomery: “I’m so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers.”

Famously not felt by Ebenezer Scrooge, A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens: “Oh! But he was a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone, Scrooge! a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous, old sinner!”

Fountains. Detective stories in bed. A walking tour. Reading in bed about foul weather. Gin and tonic, 1940. Romantic recognition. Coming home.

These are some of the smallest things in life that delight J.B. Priestley, a British critic, essayist, and dramatist. He shares these moments in his collection of essays, which he named “Delight”. The book came about for two reasons: he wrote this in response to the bleak few years following the Second World War, and he wanted it to be his “apology, a penitence” for being so scathing, “for having grumbled so much”.

Some of his delights are more relatable and timeless (mineral water in bedrooms of foreign hotels, suddenly doing nothing, meeting a friend) than others (manly talk, frightening civil servants, bragging). 

What is delight? According to Priestley, it’s the antidote to his modus operandi; it’s the thing that stops him from grumbling. Looking at a dictionary definition and its history might illuminate the emotion further. It comes from the Latin delectare ‘to charm, to please’; words like delectable and delicious come from the same root. Delight is just a variation of those, and both the noun and verb entered English lexicon in the 1200s. At the time it was spelt delite, until in the 16th century when it adopted, by chance, the spelling we know today.

18th-century philosopher John Locke considers “delight” a feeling that goes beyond “joy”. Together with pain and uneasiness, he identifies these as his four essential feelings from which all other emotions bloom. The use of the word peaked around the 1820s. But it’s fallen somewhat out of fashion; with the word’s popularity dropping with each century that came after.

And its usage now? It’s used in business contexts with the term “customer delight”. Like Priestley’s grumbling, “delight points” foil the “pain points” of a customer journey. Think of a bad customer service conversation you’ve had, and compare that to one that left you smiling. Importantly, it’s more than just about satisfying the customer; “delighted customers leave an experience feeling happy, pleasantly surprised and relieved.”

Just as Locke’s philosophy extends the concept of delight beyond simple pleasure, architectural and design firm Perkins Eastman views customer delight as an experience that surpasses basic expectations. According to them, delight occurs when service exceeds expectations, goes “above and beyond”, and anticipates needs before they are even voiced.

In a similar vein, modern American poet Ross Gay embodies this notion of delight in his Book of Delights. For an entire year, he made a conscious effort to notice at least one thing each day that brought him joy, raising his finger and exclaiming “delight!” whenever he found one. His overwhelming joy has even been described as “drowning in delight”.

“If there’s a gesture that the book has, the gesture is elbowing my neighbour”, says Gay. “‘Look at this beautiful thing.’ Which is right next to saying, ‘look at this thing that I love,’ which is right next to saying ‘share this thing I love with me,’ to do that as a practice”.

Delight, it seems, brings people together. Even if it’s a solitary experience, it’s about sharing it with another. It’s taking a moment to notice what there is to delight in – especially in a world that encourages and rewards discourse, dissent, hatred and anger – and sharing that thought with another.