English
blather
Pronunciation
  • (British) IPA: /blæðə(ɹ)/
Verb

blather (blathers, present participle blathering; past and past participle blathered)

  1. (intransitive, pejorative) To talk rapidly without making much sense.
    • 1866, George Eliot, Felix Holt, the Radical, Edinburgh: William Blackwood, Volume 1, Chapter 11, p. 249,
      “There you go blatherin’,” said Brindle, intending a mild rebuke.
    • 1914, James Joyce, “Grace (short story” in Dubliners, London: Grant Richards, p. 210,
      It was at the unveiling of Sir John Gray’s statue. Edmund Dwyer Gray was speaking, blathering away, and here was this old fellow, crabbed-looking old chap, looking at him from under his bushy eyebrows.
    • 2001, Richard Flanagan, Gould's Book of Fish, New York: Grove Atlantic, 2014, “The Pot-Bellied Seahorse,” section 5,
      On and on he blathered, taking refuge in the one thing he felt lent him superiority: words.
  2. (transitive, pejorative) To say (something foolish or nonsensical); to say (something) in a foolish or overly verbose way.
    • 1929, Eugene O'Neill, Dynamo (play), New York: Liveright, Act 1, Scene 1, p. 31,
      Then, just before the wedding, the old man feels he’s honor bound to tell his future son-in-law the secret of his past; so the damned idiot blathers the whole story of his killing the man and breaking jail!
    • 1974, Robert Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, New York: William Morrow, Part 3, Chapter 18, p. 214,
      […] the church attitude has never been that a teacher should be allowed to blather anything that comes into his head without any accountability at all.
Translations Noun

blather (uncountable)

  1. (pejorative) Nonsensical or foolish talk.
    • 1897, G. A. Henty, With Moore at Corunna, New York: Scribner, Chapter 1, p. 16,
      That is the worst of being in an Irish regiment, nothing can be done widout ever so much blather;
    • 1922, Rafael Sabatini, Captain Blood (novel), New York: Grosset & Dunlap, Chapter 23, p. 265,
      Will you cease your blather of mutiny and treason and courts-martial?
    • 1995, Rohinton Mistry, A Fine Balance, Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, Part 5, p. 280,
      With years of proofreading under my belt, I knew exactly the blather and bluster favoured by professional politicians.
Synonyms Noun

blather (plural blathers)

  1. Obsolete form of bladder#English|bladder.
    • 1596, Charles Fitzgeoffrey, Sir Francis Drake His Honorable Lifes Commendation, and His Tragicall Deathes Lamentation, Oxford: Joseph Barnes,
      […] on Odysseus Circe did bestowe
      A blather, where the windes imboweld were,


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