loveableness

plural loveablenesses

1. alternativeuncountableusuallyAlternative spelling of lovableness.

   The poplars and “China” trees of El Paso are fair, and have certain loveablenesses of their very own, such as the gentle motion of the lightly-swung leaves of the one and the springtime fragrance and violet color of the flowers of the other.

   1900 April, Elsie McElroy Slater, “From the Southwest”, in Ella B. Kendrick, editor, Talks and Tales, volume III, number 7, Hartford, Conn.: Press of the Conn Institute and Industrial Home for the Blind, →OCLC, page 3

   2 more examples

   Wise father he—“the Lord’s chore-boy” one called him,—the sunny-faced old Abolitionist, who brought his children up to know that “the one thing worth living for is to love and to be loved.” But as to recipes for loveableness, the young soul in its romance laughs to scorn so kitchen-like a question. And right to laugh the young soul is; for much in the business passeth recipe.

   1887, William C[hanning] Gannett, “‘I Had a Friend’”, in William C. Gannett, Jenkin Lloyd Jones, The Faith that Makes Faithful, Chicago, Ill.: Charles H[ope] Kerr & Company, page 36

   There’s a sick comfort in reciting this litany of defects. Maybe I sensed them at the time but I never put them into words. Now that I suspect he’s a cunt, however, I’m hauling them out and examining them in the pitiless light of day. This happens at the end of every relationship, I’ve found, but in this particular case I have an even more urgent need to destroy my lover’s loveableness, bit by bit, until it’s entirely gone.

   2015, Deborah Moggach, “Oreya, West Africa”, in Something to Hide, London: Chatto & Windus, →ISBN, part 2, page 180