Definitions

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective Pertaining to, or in the style of the dramatist and librettist W. S. Gilbert; ludicrously comic

Etymologies

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Examples

  • To turn a private name into a public epithet is a thing given to few: but the word "Gilbertian" will probably last longer than the name Gilbert.

    The Victorian Age in Literature 1905

  • There was something so "Gilbertian" in the idea of a prisoner acting as his own jailer!

    From Paris to New York by Land Harry De Windt 1894

  • But most of the lyrics in Happiest Girl in the World show off Harburg at his satirical, Gilbertian, rhyme-happy best, as in "Vive La Virtue" (also to a tune from Belle Helene):

    Obscure Musical of the Week: "The Happiest Girl in the World" Jaime J. Weinman 2004

  • Harburg's work combines two styles; there's the Gilbertian style, full of nutty rhymes and mangling of the English language ( "Something Sort of Grandish").

    Obscure Musical of the Week: "The Happiest Girl in the World" Jaime J. Weinman 2004

  • They were both born in unpromising circumstances, but their ascent to the high peaks of fame and fortune was even more successful than that of such renowned Gilbertian social climbers as the judge in Trial by Jury or Sir Joseph Porter in HMS Pinafore.

    Three Who Made a Revolution Cannadine, David 1991

  • Swift had visited the Royal Society where he would have seen the Gilbertian terrella described in the catalogue as β€œan orbicular loadstone, about four inches and 1/2 in Diameter.”

    COSMIC VOYAGES MARJORIE HOPE NICOLSON 1968

  • An appointment of a secretary was made in 1804, though it was an appointment of expedience, and had about it something of the flavour of the Gilbertian.

    Lloyd's Of London 1960

  • Landladies apart, however, the populace pooh-poohed the Gilbertian decree.

    The Siege of Kimberley T. Phelan

  • He had skimmed drowsily through the first ten lines or so when one of the Gilbertian carabineros appeared from behind a cactus-bush and accused him of being a smuggler.

    Try Anything Twice 1938

  • This proceeding, solemnly carried out on the edge of the wilderness, and in sound of the roaring waters of the Gulf, is not without a _Gilbertian_ spice.

    Mexico Its Ancient and Modern Civilisation, History, Political Conditions, Topography, Natural Resources, Industries and General Development Martin [Editor] Hume 1919

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