flummery

Wikipedia has an article on:

Wikipedia

English

Etymology

Welsh llymru, a jelly derived from oatmeal

Noun

flummery (plural flummeries)

  1. A custard; any of several bland, gelatinous foodstuffs, usually made from stewed fruit and thickened with oatmeal, cornstarch or flour
  2. empty or meaningless talk
  3. deceptive or blustering speech; bullshit
    • 1940: Rex Stout, Over My Dead Body - "Pfui! This is flummery!"
    • This is not the age of reason, this is the age of flummery, and the day of the devious approach. Reason’s gone into the backrooms where it works to devise means by which people can be induced to emote in the desired direction.[1]

Interjection

flummery!

  1. an expression of contemptuous disbelief

References

  1. ^ John Wyndham, The Trouble With Lichen (1960), Penguin Books. pg. 91.

Read in another language

This page is available in 5 languages

Last modified on 27 November 2011, at 20:11