Suspense is the tense state of waiting to find out what happens. Keep them in suspense, unbearable suspense, the suspense is killing me.
Hitchcock explained it exactly: showing the audience the bomb under the table and not the characters creates suspense, while a surprise explosion creates only a shock. The word is the same root as suspend, since the outcome is hanging.
1nounsuspenseThe tense state of waiting to find out what happens.
“The final episode kept viewers in suspense until the very last minute.”
suspense is a tension.
Old French suspens comes from Latin suspensus, hanging, from suspendere, to hang up.
Latin
suspēnsus
Old French
suspens
Anglo-Norman
suspens
Middle English
suspense
English, today
suspense
From Middle English suspense, suspence, from Anglo-Norman suspens (as in en suspens) and Old French suspens, from Latin suspēnsus.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA