gape-mouthed

See also: gapemouthed

English

Alternative forms

• gapemouthed

Etymology

gape +‎ mouthed

Adjective

gape-mouthed (comparative more gape-mouthed, superlative most gape-mouthed)

1. Overwhelmed with awe or astonishment.
   • 1829, The Book of the Boudoir by Lady Morgan. Vol. 1, page 150:

     "You may be wise in your study in the morning,” (says brow-beating Johnson, to his gape-mouthed admirer Boswell,) “ and gay in company at a tavern in the evening.”

   • 2004, Paul Douglas Lockhart, Sweden in the Seventeenth Century, →ISBN:

     This argument also does Sweden, her king, and Chancellor Oxenstierna a regrettable historical injustice, for it trivializes the gape-mouthed surprise with which most European statesmen greeted the initial successes of the Swedish invaders in 1631.

   • 2013, Raymond Tallis, Why the Mind Is Not a Computer: A Pocket Lexicon of .Neuromythology, →ISBN:

     The brain, we are to understand, is sufficiently complex to supoprt higher functions because it is composed of some 10,000,000,000 neurons; and, as if this were not sufficient to leave one gape-mouthed with uncritical awe, it is pointed out that each of these components connects with numerous other components, so that the possible number of sub-units or combinations exceeds the number of atoms in the universe.

   • 2014, Crime Files 2014: Volume 2, →ISBN:

     Finally there were the fugitive images that imprinted themselves on his fizzling, fading brain as his gape-mouthed head spun in the air: a night sky flocked with gentle clouds; the saffron glow of the lamps along the riverbank; the door to the synagogue garret, flapping open in the breeze.

2. Having a wide-open mouth.
   • 2006, Gerald Durrell, The Corfu Trilogy, →ISBN:

     So in the spring my room and that portion of the veranda set aside for the purpose always had at least half a dozen cages and boxes containing gape-mouthed baby birds or birds that I had managed to rescue from the sportsmen and which were recuperating with makeshift splints on wings or legs.

   • 2012, John Jeremiah Sullivan, Pulphead: Dispatches from the Other Side of America, →ISBN, page 153:

     And on the second OOOOOOO, you picture just a naked glowing green skull that hangs there vibrating gape-mouthed in a prison cell.

   • 2014, Robert Holdstock, Gate of Ivory, Gate of Horn, →ISBN:

     A corpse swirled past me, gape-mouthed, fish-white, dull eyed.

   • 2015, Felicity Savage, A Trickster in the Ashes: An Epic Fantasy Adventure:

     At the best of times it had been too tight, and now the gape-mouthed face resembled a blue tomato.

3. Having a wide opening.
   • 2008, Solon Timothy Woodward, Cadillac Orpheus: A Novel, →ISBN, page 68:

     A gape-mouthed wicker trunk served as a hive.

   • 2008, Richard Morgan, Woken Furies, →ISBN:

     Now the grime-filmed upper-level windows of their facades peered sadly across at each other over gape-mouthed loading bay entrances whose shutters were all jammed somewhere uncommitted between open and closed.

   • 2014, KS Augustin, Quinten's Revenge, →ISBN:

     The alien gently manoeuvred the ship out of the gape-mouthed bay.

Adverb

gape-mouthed (comparative more gape-mouthed, superlative most gape-mouthed)

1. In a state of awe or astonishment.
   • 2014, Brendon Burchard, The Motivation Manifesto, →ISBN:

     As much as we check in, we are checking out of our own lives and becoming voyeuristic, peering gape-mouthed into the sordid details of other people's lives in order to feel connected or entertained.

   • 2015, Tracy Weber, Karma's a Killer: A Downward Dog Mystery, →ISBN:

     I paused at the entrance and stared, gape-mouthed.

   • 2015, Julia Kent, Shopping for a Billionaire:

     He tosses two twenties on the table and with a gentle nudge turns me away from Steve, who sits there, impotent, staring gape-mouthed at the cash.