blood and thunder
See also: blood-and-thunder
English
editNoun
edit- Violence and aggression.
- 1920, Hugh Walpole, chapter IV, in The Captives[1]:
- […] she could fancy how Thurston was saying to himself: "But what's the good of this? It's blood and thunder we want. The old feller's getting past his work. He must go."
Adjective
editblood and thunder (not comparable)
- Both melodramatically violent and aggressive.
- blood-and-thunder stories
- 1899, Helen Cody Wetmore, Zane Grey, Last of the Great Scouts[2]:
- Not Buffalo Bill's! He gave us a jack-o'-lantern scare once upon a time, which I don't believe any of us will ever forget. We had never seen that weird species of pumpkin, and Will embroidered a blood-and-thunder narrative.
- 1904, George Barr McCutcheon, chapter VI, in Beverly of Graustark[3]:
- "Your husband is an American. He should be able to keep you well entertained with blood-and-thunder stories," said he.
- 1922, William T. Hornaday, The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals[4]:
- Very sincerely do we wish that at least one of the many romance writers who are so industriously inventing wild-animal blood-and-thunder stories would do more work with his eyes and less with his imagination.
Derived terms
editInterjection
edit- Exclamation of shock or frustration.
- 1748, [Tobias Smollett], chapter XI, in The Adventures of Roderick Random. […], volume I, London: […] [William Strahan] for J. Osborn […], →OCLC, page 75:
- Strap following, with the knapsack on his back, chanced to take the other side, and, by a jolt of the carriage, pitched directly upon the stomach of the captain, who bellowed out, in a most dreadful manner, “Blood and thunder! where’s my sword?”
- 1851 November 14, Herman Melville, Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC:
- "Man the capstan! Blood and thunder!—jump!"—was the next command, and the crew sprang for the handspikes.