nook and cranny

English

Noun

nook and cranny (plural nooks and crannies)

1. (idiomatic) A place or part of a place, especially small or remote.

   Everyone went to sleep in some nook and cranny of the house.

   • 1966, Pat Shaw Iversen (tr.), “Soup from a Sausage Peg”, in The Snow Queen and Other Tales, 1st edition, translation of Fairy Tales by Hans Christian Andersen, page 224:

     It's strange to come away from home, from your own nook and cranny, to go by ship – which is also a kind of nook and cranny – and then suddenly be more than a hundred miles away and stand in a foreign land!

   • 2021 April 7, Christian Wolmar, “Electrification is a given... but comfort matters as well”, in RAIL, number 928, page 47:

     Ever since the post-war spread of the motor car, the railways have had to contend with tough competition, but have had an inherent advantage in the commuter and inter-city markets. Now they are about to face two new enemies - a technology that everyone has learnt to use and a virus that many people think lurks in every nook and cranny of the rail system.

Synonyms

• nook or cranny (negative sentences)

Derived terms

• every nook and cranny
• every old nook and cranny

Translations

small or remote place

• French: tous les coins et les recoins
• German: Winkel (de) m, in jeder Ecke und jedem Winkel (in every nook and cranny)
• Irish: gach cearn is clúid (literally “every nook and cranny”)
• Italian: anfratto (it) m
• Japanese: 隅々まで (sumizumi made)
• Persian: سوراخ سنبه (surâx sonbe)
• Swedish: skrymsle (sv) n, vrå (sv) c, skrymslen och vrår (nooks and crannies)

Anagrams

• crook and nanny