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Definition 2024


gormless

gormless

English

Alternative forms

Adjective

gormless (comparative more gormless, superlative most gormless)

  1. (chiefly Britain, of a person) Lacking intelligence, sense or understanding; foolish.
    • 1847, Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights, Chapter XXI
      Did I ever look so stupid: so gormless as Joseph calls it?
    • 1988, Roald Dahl, Matilda, page 4:
      But Mr. and Mrs. Wormwood were both so gormless and so wrapped up in their own silly little lives that they failed to notice anything unusual about their daughter.
    • 1990, Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures, page 171:
      There was a sort of gormless unstoppability about him that she found rather fascinating.
    • 2007, J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, London: Bloomsbury Publishing, 978-0-7475-9106-1:, chapter 8, The Wedding, Auntie Muriel, page 141:
      “Hmm. Made an excuse, did he? Not as gormless as he looks in press photographs, then. […]”
    • 2015, Adele Abbott, Witch Is When Everything Went Crazy, page 33:
      “Don’t just stand there looking gormless. There’s plenty of work to do in the back.”

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