impracticable
English edit
Etymology edit
From im- + practicable.
Pronunciation edit
Adjective edit
impracticable (comparative more impracticable, superlative most impracticable)
- not practicable; impossible or difficult in practice
- Antonym: practicable
- impassable (of a passage or road)
- (obsolete, of a person or thing) unmanageable
- 1713, Nicholas Rowe, The Fair Penitent[1], published 1797:
- And yet this tough impracticable heart / Is govern'd by a dainty-finger'd girl ; […]
- c. 1841, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Journals and Miscellaneous Notebooks[2], published 1960, page 18:
- H. is a person of extraordinary health & vigor, of unerring perception, & equal expression; and yet he is impracticable, and does not flow through his pen or (in any of our legitimate aqueducts) through his tongue.
Derived terms edit
Translations edit
not practicable
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impassable
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Noun edit
impracticable (plural impracticables)
- (obsolete) an unmanageable person
- 1829, Henry Barkley Henderson, The Bengalee, or Sketches of Society and Manners in the East[3], page 13:
- They were not allowed, of course, to join us in the sitting room, partly that their practice might not be disturbed, but principally, that I was looked upon as an utter impracticable.
- 1867, James Parton, Famous Americans of Recent Times[4], page 83:
- The strict constructionists had dwindled to a few impracticables, headed by John Randolph.
- 1870, Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Clubs”, in Society and Solitude. Twelve Chapters, Boston, Mass.: Fields, Osgood, & Co., →OCLC, page 208:
- Then there are the gladiators, to whom it is always a battle; 't is no matter on which side, they fight for victory; then the heady men, the egotists, the monotones, the steriles, and the impracticables.
Spanish edit
Etymology edit
From in- + practicable.
Pronunciation edit
Adjective edit
impracticable m or f (masculine and feminine plural impracticables)
Derived terms edit
Further reading edit
- “impracticable”, in Diccionario de la lengua española, Vigésima tercera edición, Real Academia Española, 2014