Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A light dramatic work in which highly improbable plot situations, exaggerated characters, and often slapstick elements are used for humorous effect.
  • noun The branch of literature constituting such works.
  • noun The broad or spirited humor characteristic of such works.
  • noun A ludicrous, empty show; a mockery.
  • noun A seasoned stuffing, as for roasted turkey.
  • transitive verb To pad (a speech, for example) with jokes or witticisms.
  • transitive verb To stuff, as for roasting.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To stuff; cram.
  • Specifically In cookery, to stuff, as a pudding, fowl, or roast, with various meats, oysters, bread, or other ingredients, variously flavored or spiced; fill with stuffing.
  • Figuratively, to fill, as a speech or written composition, with various scraps of wit or humor; make “spicy.”
  • To extend; swell out.
  • To fatten.
  • noun A secular dramatic composition of a ludicrous or satirical character; low comedy.
  • noun Ridiculous parade; absurd pageantry; foolish show.
  • noun A ridiculous sham.
  • To paint.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • transitive verb obsolete To stuff with forcemeat; hence, to fill with mingled ingredients; to fill full; to stuff.
  • transitive verb obsolete To render fat.
  • transitive verb obsolete To swell out; to render pompous.
  • noun (Cookery) Stuffing, or mixture of viands, like that used on dressing a fowl; forcemeat.
  • noun A low style of comedy; a dramatic composition marked by low humor, generally written with little regard to regularity or method, and abounding with ludicrous incidents and expressions.
  • noun Ridiculous or empty show.

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

  • noun uncountable A style of humor marked by broad improbabilities with little regard to regularity or method; compare sarcasm
  • noun countable A motion picture or play featuring this style of humor.
  • noun uncountable A situation abounding with ludicrous incidents
  • noun uncountable A ridiculous or empty show

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • verb fill with a stuffing while cooking
  • noun mixture of ground raw chicken and mushrooms with pistachios and truffles and onions and parsley and lots of butter and bound with eggs
  • noun a comedy characterized by broad satire and improbable situations

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English farse, stuffing, from Old French farce, stuffing, interpolation, interlude, from Vulgar Latin *farsa, from feminine of Latin farsus, variant of fartus, past participle of farcīre, to stuff.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English farcen, from Old French farsir, farcir, from Latin farcire ("to cram, stuff").

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Examples

Comments

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  • Paris Hilton is out of jail! Justice for pretty people!

    June 7, 2007

  • I'm trying to figure out which part was more farcical, the part about justice or the part about pretty.

    June 7, 2007

  • I say both. :-\

    June 7, 2007

  • The farce thickens... She's back in jail and quoted as saying, "I feel like I'm in a cage!"

    June 11, 2007

  • No way does that describe jail!

    June 11, 2007

  • Not for her!

    June 11, 2007

  • JM has to rewrite something as a comedy rather than a drama, basically he has to do an about farce.

    August 26, 2011

  • ludicrous incidents of butter and Cyclopedia

    n. countable A situation abounding with stuffing. Figuratively, to stuff.

    n. (Cookery) Stuffing, or play featuring this style and often slapstick elements are used for roasting.

    Century Dictionary and parsley and parsley and paint.

    Ridiculous parade;

    absurd pageantry; foolish show.

    A light work in many churches was a dramatic composition markedly broad parsley and Cyclopedia

    interlude

    To stuff with little regard to regularity or fartus, past participle of a ludicrous method

    To extend; swell out, hence Latin and onions.

    To stuff with jokes or empty Webster's 1913 with mingled ingredients: (farsia) was a farce.

    spirited humor marked by low humor, generally written with eggs

    ludicrous

    to render a mixture of fat literature constituting such works

    exaggerated characters and lots of ground raw chicken

    a motion picture pudding, fowl, or principal festival.

    expressions: The branch of butter and French sung in a farce. n. a dramatic composition

    *farsa, *farsa, *farsa, *farsa

    January 11, 2013

  • Ha. Great one, bilby!

    January 12, 2013