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From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.44 [gcide]:
Grotesque \Gro*tesque"\ (gr[-o]*t[e^]sk"), adjective [F., fr. It. grottesco, fr. grotta grotto. See {Grotto}.]
1. Like the figures found in ancient grottoes; grottolike.
2. Hence: Wildly or strangely formed; whimsical; extravagant; of irregular forms and proportions; fantastic; ludicrous; antic. ''Grotesque design.'' --Dryden. ''Grotesque incidents.'' --Macaulay.
From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.44 [gcide]:
Grotesque \Gro*tesque\, noun
1. A whimsical figure, or scene, such as is found in old crypts and grottoes. --Dryden.
2. Artificial grotto-work.
From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:
grotesque
adjective
1: distorted and unnatural in shape or size; abnormal and hideous; "tales of grotesque serpents eight fathoms long that churned the seas"; "twisted into monstrous shapes" [syn: {monstrous}, {unnatural}]
2: ludicrously odd; "Hamlet's assumed antic disposition"; "fantastic Halloween costumes"; "a grotesque reflection in the mirror" [syn: {antic}, {fantastic}, {fantastical}]
noun: art characterized by an incongruous mixture of parts of humans and animals interwoven with plants
From Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 [moby-thes]:
125 Moby Thesaurus words for "grotesque": Gothic, aberrant, abnormal, absurd, anomalous, antic, art object, bandy, bandy-legged, baroque, beyond belief, bizarre, blemished, bloated, bowlegged, brain-born, brainchild, bric-a-brac, cacogenic, classic, club-footed, cockamamie, comic, comical, composition, crazy, creation, curious, defaced, deformed, design, disfigured, distorted, dream-built, droll, dwarfed, eerie, extravagant, extreme, fanciful, fancy-born, fancy-built, fancy-woven, fantasque, fantastic, flamboyant, flatfooted, florid, foolish, freak, freakish, gargoylish, gnarled, gruesome, high-flown, ill-made, ill-proportioned, ill-shaped, incongruous, incredible, kitsch, knock-kneed, laughable, ludicrous, maggoty, malformed, marred, master, masterpiece, masterwork, misbegotten, misproportioned, misshapen, mobile, monstrous, museum piece, mutilated, nonsensical, notional, nude, odd, offbeat, old master, out of shape, outlandish, outrageous, outre, pasticcio, pastiche, peculiar, piece, piece of virtu, pigeon-toed, poppycockish, preposterous, pug-nosed, queer, rachitic, rickety, ridiculous, rococo, shapeless, simous, snub-nosed, stabile, statue, still life, strange, study, stumpy, swaybacked, talipedic, teratic, teratogenic, teratoid, truncated, twisted, uncanny, unshapely, virtu, weird, whimsical, wild, work, work of art
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Definitions retrieved from local copies of the freely distributed DICT client/server software and databases. Click here for database copyright information. - KM |