PREPOSTEROUS • FREE-TRANSLATOR.COM • Definition of Preposterous

Translators

Dictionaries

Courses

Other

Home

Add this Dictionary
to your website!
See more options...

/prɪpˈɑstərəs/ /prɪpˈɑstrəs/ Listen

adjective

Preposterous adj.

Having that first which ought to be last; inverted in order. (Obs.) "The method I take may be censured as preposterous, because I thus treat last of the antediluvian earth, which was first in the order of nature."

Contrary to nature or reason; not adapted to the end; utterly and glaringly foolish; unreasonably absurd; perverted. "Most preposterous conclusions." "Preposterous ass, that never read so far!"

Synonyms: Absurd; perverted; wrong; irrational; foolish; monstrous. See Absurd.

See images of 'Preposterous'

Etymology of 'Preposterous'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

Share |

"Preposterous" Quotes from Famous Books

... "It's preposterous that they should knock off work without any reason," he once told Morten, when the baker's driver had thrown up his place. "Like your driver, for example—he had no ground ...

— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo

... preposterous! There are not enough people in Cherokee Strip to give anybody a reputation, good or bad. There isn't a quorum. Why the whole population consists of a couple of wagon loads of ...

— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... incompatible); of having followed the system of Pope (of which there is not a word in his works); of having quoted Plutarch, who is not a Christian author; of not having spoken of original sin and of grace. In a word, he pretended that the 'Spirit of Laws' was a production of the constitution Unigenitus; a preposterous idea. Those who understand M. de Montesquieu and Clement XI. may judge, by ...

— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner

... conscious of her presence—a presence which now had all the absurdity of her ridiculous love-experiences superadded to it. He tried to reason with himself that it was only a phase of frontier life, which ought to have amused him. But it did not. The intrusion of this preposterous girl seemed to disarrange the discipline of his life as well as of his school. The usual vague, far-off dreams in which he was in the habit of indulging during school-hours, dreams that were perhaps superinduced by the remoteness of his retreat and a certain ...

— Cressy • Bret Harte

... replying. Her first impulse was to reject the proposal as preposterous. The hour seemed very ill chosen. Rebecca was not accustomed to leaving home for any purpose at night, and ...

— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye

More quotes...