Fanciful
adjective
Something that is not real and is invented from the imagination.
She had a fanciful dream about living in a castle.
Often appears as...
- fanciful tale
- fanciful dream
adjective
Something that is unusual, complicated and showing a lot of imagination.
She wore a fanciful dress with flowers and stars on it.
Often appears as...
- fanciful design
- fanciful dress
adjective
Something that is not real and is invented from the imagination.
She had a fanciful dream about living in a castle.
Often appears as...
- fanciful tale
- fanciful dream
adjective
Something that is unusual, complicated and showing a lot of imagination.
She wore a fanciful dress with flowers and stars on it.
Often appears as...
- fanciful design
- fanciful dress
Definition 1 of 2
Pro Tip 1/3Imagination Over Reality
Use 'fanciful' to describe ideas or stories that come from imagination instead of real life.
His fanciful plan to travel to Mars ignored the limits of current technology.
Pro Tip 2/3Unlikely Scenarios
'Fanciful' can suggest an idea is imaginative but unlikely to happen, often because it's too idealistic.
Her proposal was dismissed as a fanciful notion by the committee.
Pro Tip 3/3Creative but Unserious
'Fanciful' often hints that something is creative but not serious or practical.
The author's fanciful characters captivated children but puzzled adults.
Pro Tip 1/3Imagination Over Reality
Use 'fanciful' to describe ideas or stories that come from imagination instead of real life.
His fanciful plan to travel to Mars ignored the limits of current technology.
Pro Tip 2/3Unlikely Scenarios
'Fanciful' can suggest an idea is imaginative but unlikely to happen, often because it's too idealistic.
Her proposal was dismissed as a fanciful notion by the committee.
Pro Tip 3/3Creative but Unserious
'Fanciful' often hints that something is creative but not serious or practical.
The author's fanciful characters captivated children but puzzled adults.
Pro Tip 1/3Imagination Over Reality
Use 'fanciful' to describe ideas or stories that come from imagination instead of real life.
His fanciful plan to travel to Mars ignored the limits of current technology.
Pro Tip 2/3Unlikely Scenarios
'Fanciful' can suggest an idea is imaginative but unlikely to happen, often because it's too idealistic.
Her proposal was dismissed as a fanciful notion by the committee.
Pro Tip 3/3Creative but Unserious
'Fanciful' often hints that something is creative but not serious or practical.
The author's fanciful characters captivated children but puzzled adults.
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Video examples
Keith Chen: Could your...
If, on the other hand, you speak a futureless language, the present and the future, you speak about them identically. If that subtly nudges you to feel about them identically, that's going to make it easier to save. Now this is a fanciful theory. I'm a professor, I get paid to have fanciful theories.
Video examples
Could your language...
other hand you speak a futureless language the present in the future you speak about them identically if that subtly nudges you to feel about them identically that's going to make it easier to save now this is a fanciful theory you know I'm a professor I get paid to have fanciful theories but how
Video examples
How computers are...
about what we know about brains. Because unlike, say, the heart or the intestines, you really can't say very much about a brain by just looking at it, at least with the naked eye. The early anatomists who looked at brains gave the superficial structures of this thing all kinds of fanciful names,
Video examples
Don Tapscott: Four...
You can see on the right here, there's a predator being chased away by the collective power of the birds, and apparently this is a frightening thing if you're a predator of starlings. And there's leadership, but there's no one leader. Now, is this some kind of fanciful analogy,
Video examples
Robert Gordon: The death...
The problem we face is that all these great inventions, we have to match them in the future, and my prediction that we're not going to match them brings us down from the original two-percent growth down to 0.2, the fanciful curve that I drew you at the beginning.
Video examples
Krista Tippett:...
And that the highest human calling is to look for this light, to point at it when we see it, to gather it up, and in so doing, to repair the world. Now this might sound like a fanciful tale. Some of my fellow journalists might interpret it that way.
Video examples
Elaine Morgan says we...
I mean, it's a terrible thing to happen. You've got this beautiful paradigm. You've believed it through generations. Nobody has questioned it. You've been constructing fanciful things on top of it, relying on it to be as solid as a rock.
Video examples
Living in a shadow PIPE...
sits there and cartons and in stacks out of you where it can't make him sad in the studio Barrie showed me an old painting of Claire's something he'd rescued from the garbage in a fanciful
Video examples
How We Can Make the...
and the answer, shockingly, is that maybe we actually can. But not with business as usual. Now, the idea that the world is going to get a better place may seem a little fanciful.
Video examples
Live from Mars 360° PIPE...
what we're doing building this colony and it's got another question what's the most and I think it's for you Adrian and the boys what's the most fanciful or
Video examples
Keith Chen: Could your...
If, on the other hand, you speak a futureless language, the present and the future, you speak about them identically. If that subtly nudges you to feel about them identically, that's going to make it easier to save. Now this is a fanciful theory. I'm a professor, I get paid to have fanciful theories.
Video examples
Could your language...
other hand you speak a futureless language the present in the future you speak about them identically if that subtly nudges you to feel about them identically that's going to make it easier to save now this is a fanciful theory you know I'm a professor I get paid to have fanciful theories but how
Video examples
How computers are...
about what we know about brains. Because unlike, say, the heart or the intestines, you really can't say very much about a brain by just looking at it, at least with the naked eye. The early anatomists who looked at brains gave the superficial structures of this thing all kinds of fanciful names,
Video examples
Don Tapscott: Four...
You can see on the right here, there's a predator being chased away by the collective power of the birds, and apparently this is a frightening thing if you're a predator of starlings. And there's leadership, but there's no one leader. Now, is this some kind of fanciful analogy,
Video examples
Robert Gordon: The death...
The problem we face is that all these great inventions, we have to match them in the future, and my prediction that we're not going to match them brings us down from the original two-percent growth down to 0.2, the fanciful curve that I drew you at the beginning.
Video examples
Krista Tippett:...
And that the highest human calling is to look for this light, to point at it when we see it, to gather it up, and in so doing, to repair the world. Now this might sound like a fanciful tale. Some of my fellow journalists might interpret it that way.
Video examples
Elaine Morgan says we...
I mean, it's a terrible thing to happen. You've got this beautiful paradigm. You've believed it through generations. Nobody has questioned it. You've been constructing fanciful things on top of it, relying on it to be as solid as a rock.
Video examples
Living in a shadow PIPE...
sits there and cartons and in stacks out of you where it can't make him sad in the studio Barrie showed me an old painting of Claire's something he'd rescued from the garbage in a fanciful
Video examples
How We Can Make the...
and the answer, shockingly, is that maybe we actually can. But not with business as usual. Now, the idea that the world is going to get a better place may seem a little fanciful.
Video examples
Live from Mars 360° PIPE...
what we're doing building this colony and it's got another question what's the most and I think it's for you Adrian and the boys what's the most fanciful or
Example 1 of 10
Quote examples
Paul Dini
American Writer
I remembered what it was like: the weirdness, being the odd man out, trying to make my way around campus, and trying to figure out who my friends would be, who to steer clear of. I wrote it all down in a fanciful way - the feelings of alienation, the feelings of uncertainty, of being away from home for the first time.
Quote examples
Robin Sloan
American Author
People tend to think of the quest as a sort of fanciful or fantastical form, but actually, I think it's pretty realistic. I think that story of gathering allies to your side - recruiting your band of companions - actually matches the shape of most great careers, most great lives.
Quote examples
Tim Walker
British Photographer
When I was at college, the idea of fashion was more immediate to me, whereas art photography, the depth of it, was a different thing. Storytelling - fanciful storytelling - can only be told through fashion photography. It's the perfect way to play with fantasy and dreams.
Quote examples
Cress Williams
German Actor
As a kid, you just like anything fanciful that you're into, but as an adult, I really love that kind of place where the super hero mythos meets life, where it has that human story; that's what I think I was really drawn to when I started getting into the X-Men.
Quote examples
Matt Berry
English Actor
I think there's a chance that aliens might just see us as beef cattle, so that's us done. Whether they would inhabit us in that way is pretty fanciful because they'd probably just get from us what they could, and then I just see us as fast food.
Quote examples
Joseph Bruchac
Writer
To begin with, I want to tell a good story, a story that people will listen to and that they'll think this is true, even if it is a story that might be defined as - as myth or legend or even fanciful.
Quote examples
Patti Smith
American Musician
I had a really happy childhood - my siblings were great, my mother was very fanciful, and I loved to read. But there was always financial strife.
Quote examples
Gary Ross
American Actor
Pleasantville' seems tonally ambitious, but it can handle a wide breadth of tone because it's so fanciful.
Quote examples
Kwasi Kwarteng
British Politician
The idea that historians aren't affected by what goes on around them I think is slightly fanciful.
Quote examples
Cynthia Breazeal
American Scientist
Kids love robots. They're this fanciful, cool thing.
Quote examples
Paul Dini
American Writer
I remembered what it was like: the weirdness, being the odd man out, trying to make my way around campus, and trying to figure out who my friends would be, who to steer clear of. I wrote it all down in a fanciful way - the feelings of alienation, the feelings of uncertainty, of being away from home for the first time.
Quote examples
Robin Sloan
American Author
People tend to think of the quest as a sort of fanciful or fantastical form, but actually, I think it's pretty realistic. I think that story of gathering allies to your side - recruiting your band of companions - actually matches the shape of most great careers, most great lives.
Quote examples
Tim Walker
British Photographer
When I was at college, the idea of fashion was more immediate to me, whereas art photography, the depth of it, was a different thing. Storytelling - fanciful storytelling - can only be told through fashion photography. It's the perfect way to play with fantasy and dreams.
Quote examples
Cress Williams
German Actor
As a kid, you just like anything fanciful that you're into, but as an adult, I really love that kind of place where the super hero mythos meets life, where it has that human story; that's what I think I was really drawn to when I started getting into the X-Men.
Quote examples
Matt Berry
English Actor
I think there's a chance that aliens might just see us as beef cattle, so that's us done. Whether they would inhabit us in that way is pretty fanciful because they'd probably just get from us what they could, and then I just see us as fast food.
Quote examples
Joseph Bruchac
Writer
To begin with, I want to tell a good story, a story that people will listen to and that they'll think this is true, even if it is a story that might be defined as - as myth or legend or even fanciful.
Quote examples
Patti Smith
American Musician
I had a really happy childhood - my siblings were great, my mother was very fanciful, and I loved to read. But there was always financial strife.
Quote examples
Gary Ross
American Actor
Pleasantville' seems tonally ambitious, but it can handle a wide breadth of tone because it's so fanciful.
Quote examples
Kwasi Kwarteng
British Politician
The idea that historians aren't affected by what goes on around them I think is slightly fanciful.
Quote examples
Cynthia Breazeal
American Scientist
Kids love robots. They're this fanciful, cool thing.
Example 1 of 10
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