twaddle

twaddle

See also: Twaddle

English

WOTD – 16 May 2017

Etymology

An alteration of twattle (1556), of unknown origin.[1][2]

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈtwɒdəl/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈtwɑdəl/

• Audio (GA)

  (file)

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ædəl
• Hyphenation: twad‧dle

Noun

twaddle (countable and uncountable, plural twaddles)

1. (uncountable) Empty or silly idle talk or writing; nonsense, rubbish. [from 1782.]

   You're talking a load of twaddle. Get your facts straight, man!

   • 1886, A[rthur] Conan Doyle, “The Science of Deduction”, in A Study in Scarlet (Beeton's Christmas Annual; 28th season), London; New York, N.Y.: Ward Lock & Co., November 1887, →OCLC; republished as A Study in Scarlet. A Detective Story, new edition, London: Ward, Lock, Bowden, and Co., 1892, →OCLC, page 28:

     "What ineffable twaddle!" I cried, slapping the magazine down on the table; "I never read such rubbish in my life."

   • 1907, E.M. Forster, The Longest Journey, Part II, XX [Uniform ed., p. 203]:

     I would rather be rude than to listen to twaddle from a man I’ve known.

   • 1918 June​, Katherine Mansfield [pseudonym; Kathleen Mansfield Murry], “Prelude”, in Bliss and Other Stories, London: Constable & Company, published 1920, OCLC 561951956, chapter 12, page 66:

     It was her other self who had written that letter. It not only bored, it rather disgusted her real self. "Flippant and silly," said her real self. Yet she knew that she'd send it and she'd always write that kind of twaddle to Nan Pym.

2. (countable) One who twaddles; a twaddler.

Synonyms

• See also Thesaurus:chatter

Translations

Empty or silly idle talk or writing

Bulgarian: празни приказки (prazni prikazki) Chinese: Mandarin: 胡言乱语 (zh) (hú yán luàn yǔ) Danish: vrøvl c, vås n Dutch: onzin (nl) Finnish: höpinä, höpötys (fi) French: fadaise (fr) f, sornette (fr) f German: (colloquial) Gequassel (de) n, (colloquial) Quatsch (de) m, (colloquial) Gewäsch (de) n, (colloquial) Geschwätz (de) n, (colloquial) dummes Geschwätz n, (colloquial) dummes Zeug n, Geschwurbel (de) n Haitian Creole: sornèt, istwa san sans Indonesian: ocehan (id) Norwegian: pjatt n, tomprat m, tullprat m, løst prat (no) Polish: paplanina (pl) f, gadanina (pl) f, chrzanienie (pl) n (expressive), dyrdymały m pl, bzdurzenie n, brednie f pl, ględy (archaic), farmazony (pl) m pl, bajdy f pl, ambaje (pl) m pl (archaic) Portuguese: palração (pt) f Russian: трындёж m (tryndjóž), болтовня (ru) f (boltovnja) Spanish: chorrada (es) f Swedish: trams (sv) n, svammel (sv) n, dravel (sv) n, snack (sv) n, pladder (sv) n, babbel (sv) n Ukrainian: нісенітниця (uk) f (nisenitnycja), пустослів'я (uk) n (pustoslivʺja) Volapük: lupükot Westrobothnian: vhaller n

Verb

twaddle (third-person singular simple present twaddles, present participle twaddling, simple past and past participle twaddled)

1. To talk or write nonsense; to prattle.
   • 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter 12, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: Bobbs-Merrill Company, OCLC 656907741, OL 1097634W, page 181:

     To Edward […] he was terrible, nerve-inflaming, poisonously asphyxiating. He sat rocking himself in the late Mr. Churchill's swing chair, smoking and twaddling.

Synonyms

• See also Thesaurus:nonsense

Translations

To talk or write nonsense

Czech: žvanit (cs) impf, kecat (cs) impf Danish: vrøvle, våse Finnish: höpöttää (fi) Polish: paplać (pl), gadać (pl) Portuguese: palrar (pt) Russian: трындеть (ru) (tryndetʹ) Swedish: svamla (sv), pladdra (sv), babbla (sv)

References

1. “twaddle”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary
2. Douglas Harper (2001–2023), “twaddle”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.

Further reading

• twaddle (disambiguation) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia