nyctophilia

English

Etymology

From nycto- (“night”) +‎ -philia.

Pronunciation

• Rhymes: -ɪliə

Noun

nyctophilia (uncountable)

1. Love of the night; attraction (sometimes sexual) to night or darkness.
   • 1971, Americas (English Ed.), volume 23:

     which disdains psychological analysis—"the obscurities that one encounters in Herman Melville or in Franz Kafka are not due to lack of resources for illumination, to artifices, or even to nyctophilia; they derive from the ultimate mystery of existence";  […]

   • 1972, Contemporary Gujarati Poetry, Surat : Western India Publishing Company, page 6:

     Manilal Desai died at a very young age. His posthumous collection edited by his friends manifests modern lyricism, nyctophilia and death obsessions.

   • 2014, Felicia Zopol, The Sex Instruction Manual: Essential Information and Techniques for Optimum Performance, Quirk Books (→ISBN), page 174:

     Getting Lost: Lovers engaged in nyctophilia can become disoriented in near-total darkness. It's easy […] Use your voice to locate your partner, then move slowly toward the voice. […]

   • 2020, Ethan Blake, Into the Hollow, first page of chapter 4:

     It was late. The clock had just struck midnight and Thomas was distracting himself with another virtual reality horror game. Maybe it was a simple case of nyctophilia, but he found a certain level of comfort in scary games, especially the ones that involved Bigfoot. It was officially Halloween; and anything was better than thinking about that damned photograph […]