comedian
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /kəˈmiːdi.ən/
note: without stress shift from comedy
ipa: /ˈkɔməɖɪjən/
ipa: /kəˈmiɖ(ɪ)jən/
ipa: /-ˈme-/
Forms: form: comedians
form: comedienne
Etymology: From Latin cōmoedia + -an, perhaps modelled on Middle French comédien. By surface analysis, comedy + -an.
Senses: synonyms: comic
laughsmith
glosses: An entertainer who performs in a humorous manner, especially by telling jokes.
synonyms: card
cutup
gagster
joker
wag
wit
glosses: Any person who is humorous or amusing, either characteristically or on a particular occasion.
examples: text: […] the quick comedians
Extemporally will stage us, and present
Our Alexandrian revels;
ref: c. 1606–1607 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Anthonie and Cleopatra”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene ii]:
text: 1714, Susanna Centlivre, The Wonder, London: E. Curll and A. Bettesworth, Preface,
I Don’t pretend to write a Preface, either to point out the Beauties, or to excuse the Errors, a judicious Reader may possibly discover in the following Scenes, but to give those excellent Comedians their Due, to whom, in some Measure the best Dramatick Writers are oblig’d.
text: When a Comedian, celebrated for his excellence in the part of Shylock, first undertook that character, he made daily visits to the center of business, the ’Change, and the adjacent Coffee-houses; that by a frequent intercourse and conversation with “the unforeskinn’d race,” he might habituate himself to their air and deportment.
ref: 1755, George Colman, The Connaisseur, volume 1, London: R. Baldwin, page 1:
text: Becky, the nightingale, took the flowers which he threw to her and pressed them to her heart with the air of a consummate comedian.
ref: 1847 January – 1848 July, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 51, in Vanity Fair […], London: Bradbury and Evans […], published 1848, →OCLC:
synonyms: actor
player
thespian
coordinate_terms: tragedian
glosses: A person who performs in theatrical plays.
examples: text: This doth the Comedy handle ſo in our priuate and domeſtical matters, as with hearing it, we get as it were an experience, what is to be looked for of a nigardly Demea: of a crafty Danus: of a flattering Gnato: of a vaine glorious Thraſo: and not onely to know what effects are to be expected, but to know who be ſuch, by the ſignifying badge giuen them by the Comedian.
ref: a. 1587 (date written), Phillip Sidney [i.e., Philip Sidney], An Apologie for Poetrie. […], London: […] [James Roberts] for Henry Olney, […], published 1595, →OCLC; republished as Edward Arber, editor, An Apologie for Poetrie (English Reprints), London: [Alexander Murray & Son], 1 April 1868, →OCLC, pages 44–45:
text: Neither is it recorded that the writings of those old Comedians were supprest, though the acting of them were forbid;
ref: 1644, John Milton, Areopagitica; a Speech of Mr. John Milton for the Liberty of Unlicenc’d Printing, to the Parlament of England, London: [s.n.], →OCLC, page 5:
text: 1783, Hugh Blair, Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles Lettres, London: Whitestone et al., Volume 3, Lecture 47, p. 377,
[…] the Dramatic Author, in whom the French glory most, and whom they justly place at the head of all their Comedians, is, the famous Moliere.
coordinate_terms: tragedian
glosses: A writer of comedies.
Synonyms: funnyman
funnywoman
Hyponyms: sense: comedian
word: comedienne
Derived terms: prop comedian
sitcomedian