blather - Wiktionary, the free dictionary (original) (raw)

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

From Middle English bletheren, bloderen, from Old Norse blaðra (“to speak inarticulately, talk nonsense”). Cognate with Scots blether, bladder, bledder (“to blather”), dialectal German bladdern (“to talk nonsense, blather”), Norwegian bladra (“to babble, speak imperfectly”), Icelandic blaðra (“to twaddle”).

blather (third-person singular simple present blathers, present participle blathering, simple past and past participle blathered)

  1. (intransitive, derogatory) To talk rapidly without making much sense.
  2. (transitive, derogatory) To say (something foolish or nonsensical); to say (something) in a foolish or overly verbose way.
    • 1929, Eugene O’Neill, Dynamo‎[2], New York, N.Y.: Liveright, act I, scene i, page 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!

to talk rapidly without making much sense

blather (uncountable)

  1. (derogatory) Foolish or nonsensical talk.
    Synonyms: blither; see also Thesaurus:chatter
    • 1897, G. A. Henty, chapter 1, in With Moore at Corunna, New York: Scribner, page 16:
      That is the worst of being in an Irish regiment, nothing can be done widout ever so much blather;
    • 1995, Rohinton Mistry, A Fine Balance‎[3], Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, part 5, page 280:
      With years of proofreading under my belt, I knew exactly the blather and bluster favoured by professional politicians.

foolish or nonsensical talk

blather (plural blathers)

  1. Obsolete form of bladder.
    • 1596, Charles Fitzgeoffrey, Sir Francis Drake His Honorable Lifes Commendation, and His Tragicall Deathes Lamentation, Oxford: Joseph Barnes,[4]
      […] on Vlisses Circe did bestowe
      A blather, where the windes imboweld were,