Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- v. To cause to be bewildered; confuse. See Synonyms at daze.
- v. To cause to be engrossed in thought.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- To put into a muse or reverie; confuse; muddle; stupefy.
Wiktionary
GNU Webster's 1913
- v. To muddle, daze, or partially stupefy, as with liquor.
WordNet 3.0
- v. cause to be confused emotionally
Etymologies
- From be- + muse. In meaning, influenced by bemaze. (Wiktionary)
Examples
“All the other dictionaries and usage guides maintain that "bemuse" suggests a frown or furrowed brow, not a smile.”
“What has happened to "bemuse" has happened to a lot of other words: A perfectly good English word that means one thing is co-opted by people who think it means something else.”
“It's a temporary ban, designed to confuse and bemuse him, and hopefully engender a violent reaction," Morgan says.”
“As voted by you, internets, a few observations on differences that amuse/bemuse me.”
“I adapt with relative ease to the people I meet in the new places I visit and inhabit, although certain unwritten social rules continuously bemuse me.”
The Huffington Post: Millie Kerr: Unwritten Urban Rules -- The Pet Edition
“Australian novelist Christos Tsiolkas goes further, saying that the attacks by some critics on his novel The Slap as being vulgar or pornographic bemuse me as they seem to ignore how much of sexual imagination, particularly male sexual imagination, is now experienced through pornography itself.”
The Guardian: Let's not talk about sex – why passion is waning in British books
“The gendered language in this country will never cease to bemuse me.”
“I do not control the editorial approach of the tabloids, and sometimes stories run in ways that completely bemuse me and are certainly beyond any expectations.”
The Guardian: Welfare policy 'turns public against disabled'
“Yet the striker continues to perplex and bemuse in equal measure.”
The Guardian: Manchester City's rivals enjoy putting the boot into upstarts
“That partly explains the reaction in store for the 27-year-old, though Villa's anger at losing such a valuable asset may bemuse supporters of his current club as they wait for the England international to lead opponents on a merry-dance.”
The Guardian: Kenny Dalglish satisfied that Stewart Downing is proving his worth
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘bemuse’.
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LIT - Ulysses - key words and phrases
money cowrie, bedraggle, omphalos, ineluctable, postprandial, bladderwrack, modality barnacle..., loofah, shipworm, cither, embattle, Malachi and 503 more...
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Russian Doll Words
A Russian Doll word is a word that, when you remove the first and last letters, is either the empty string, or a Russian Doll word. These are all of the 6 or more letter Russian Doll words found in...
waspiness, upraisers, strainers, sporangia, raspiness, prelatess, methanals, gaspiness, washings, uprisers, upraises, upraiser and 2373 more...
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From reading
Collected from reading
venerate, reprobate, reticent, adoration, ethereal, ephemeral, equivocal, contumacious, heinous, solicitous, agnostic, aberration and 335 more...
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Muses
muse, Muses, muses, Muse, amuse, bemuse, amusement, amusement park, bal musette, museumgoer, museology, musette bag and 38 more...
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GRE Reference
A list of words unfamiliar to me that I have repeatedly encountered in GRE question sets.
parochial, clique, salacious, aegis, ostracize, conceited, sacrilegious, inane, serendipity, gourmand, polemic, tenuous and 138 more...
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Belistful
Tubey or not tubey.
belittle, bedazzle, besiege, besmirch, bespeckle, beget, bemoan, befuddle, befriend, become, besot, becloud and 596 more...
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words found to be generally pleasing
alabaster, mahogany, camphor, coalesce, spire, portmanteau, gadabout, palaver, dolor, dour, dun, luminesce and 610 more...
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Naresh_Gre
The path meanders through the vineyards
meander, labyrinth, Sinuous, gyrate, caron, awry, credo, banter, juxtaposition, argot, inexorable, foibles and 223 more...
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ADW1
obdurate, obstinate, behest, injunction, enjoin, circumspect, ensconce, discursive, lugubrious, doleful, somber, ken and 2476 more...
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Vocab++
Words as I learn them.
fetid, mezzanine, hiatus, austerity, subliminal, resplendent, implacable, impugn, debase, exiguous, cirque, holster and 2538 more...
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Sudeep's list
New words I learn.
sang-froid, haggard, gazebo, grotesque, cardinal, labyrinth, pejorative, visage, vignette, insouciant, formidable, prescient and 143 more...
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Units Of Language
Word:
-a unit of language consisting of one or more spoken sounds or their written representation, that functions as a principal carrier of meaning.sulk, promenade, skulk, idle, subsequently, moody, paroxysm, felony, anent, generic, hallucinogen, synaesthesia and 215 more...
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ginnylev's Words
neuroplasticity, repudiate, scintilla, ruminate, tautology, ombudsman, exigent, filibuster, grace, ambidextrous, amends, disclosure and 623 more...
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fearraigh's Words
heretofore, seldom, cunt, calamity, overhead, phalanx, flunky, factotum, terrestrial, dormant, afflatus, periphery and 156 more...
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thricedotted's Words
schadenfreude, vanquish, calumny, obsequious, rhapsody, expostulate, promontory, bordello, quintessence, catharsis, recapitulation, myriad and 937 more...
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mkuo's Words
sigh, chum, clandestine, behemoth, paramour, leviathan, dollop, wastrel, pedantic, hankering, warble, lope and 317 more...
Tweets
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