delightful
Appearance
English
[edit]Etymology
[edit]From Middle English deliteful, delitfull, equivalent to delight + -ful.
Pronunciation
[edit]- IPA(key): /dəˈlaɪt.fəl/
Audio (General American): (file) - Hyphenation: de‧light‧ful
Adjective
[edit]delightful (comparative more delightful or delightfuler or delightfuller, superlative most delightful or delightfulest or delightfullest)
- Pleasant; pleasing, bringing enjoyment, satisfaction, or pleasure.
- 1853, Lewis Carroll [pseudonym; Charles Lutwidge Dodgson], “The Two Brothers”, in Stuart Dodgson Collingwood, editor, The Lewis Carroll Picture Book […], London: T[homas] Fisher Unwin, published 1899, →OCLC, page 22:
- What? a higher delight to be drawn from the sight / Of fish full of life and of glee? / What a noodle you are! ’tis delightfuller far / To kill them than let them go free!
- 1888, Venier Voldo, “Memoria in Eterna”, in Poems from the Pacific: The West’s Reply to England’s Laureate, 2nd edition, San Francisco, Calif.: The Bancroft Company, →OCLC, page 134:
- O, Joy! quicker than fire! O, Hope of things! / O, gracious gladness mighty with delight! / O, subtle sweet, delightfuler than might! / Ah, me, no fiercer laughing unction springs / From the fair Hope of things!
- 1908 July 6, S[amuel] L[anghorne] Clemens, “A Letter from Mark Twain: Innocence at Home”, in Collier’s, volume XLI, number 20, New York, N.Y.: P[eter] F[enelon] Collier & Son, published 8 August 1908, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 22, column 2:
- Hon. Collier Weekly which furnish Japanese Schoolboy to public not often enough, when is his book coming out? […] That Boy is the dearest & sweetest & frankest & wisest & funniest & delightfulest & lovablest creation that has been added to our literature for a long time.
- 1977, Agatha Christie, chapter 4, in An Autobiography, part I, London: Collins, →ISBN:
- An indulgent playmate, Grannie would lay aside the long scratchy-looking letter she was writing (heavily crossed 'to save notepaper') and enter into the delightful pastime of 'a chicken from Mr Whiteley's'.
- 2013 December 11, Megan Garber, quoting Marissa Mayer, “Is ‘Delightful’ the New ‘Cool’?”, in The Atlantic[1]:
- That is what I plan to do at Yahoo: give the end user something valuable and delightful that makes them want to come to Yahoo every day.
Alternative forms
[edit]Derived terms
[edit]Translations
[edit]pleasant; pleasing
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