otherworldly
Part of speech: adj
Morphological type: derivation
Etymology: From other world (“a world beyond death; a world other than the everyday world”) + -ly (suffix meaning having the likeness of, resembling forming adjectives).
Base: other world
Affixes: -ly
Inflected forms:
form: more otherworldly
pos: adj
tags: comparative
form: most otherworldly
pos: adj
tags: superlative
form: other-worldly
pos: adj
tags: alternative
Senses:
gloss: Of, concerned with, or preoccupied with a world different from the tangible world, especially a fantasy, imaginary, or mystical world.
pos: adj
examples: In Just My Type: A Book about Fonts (2010) Simon Garfield describes [Edward] Johnston as 'a gaunt fine-boned man with a full moustache', and there's a picture of him at work with a quill pen that makes him look as other-worldly as a medieval sprite.
The bull kelp forests off Northern California are sometimes spoken of as the redwoods of the sea. And like the redwoods, these forests are in danger. In less than a decade, these otherworldly undersea landscapes, lush with life, have all but disappeared along 200 miles of coast north of San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge.
gloss: Of, concerned with, or preoccupied with a world different from the tangible world, especially a fantasy, imaginary, or mystical world.
pos: adj
tags: figuratively
examples: He had not seen cricket played since the war began; it seemed almost other-worldly, with the click of the bats, and the shrill young voices, under the distant drone of that sky-hornet threshing along to Hendon.
An almost otherworldly resilience has characterized the 40-year arc of the Clintons' political lives, a well-documented pattern of dazzling success, shattering setback and inevitable recovery.
"Hey, Rick." / "Oh, hey, kiddo. How's your Saturday?" / "You know, super chill. W-W-Whatcha doin'?" / "Eh, nothing adventurous. You know that race of Underground Dwelling Cannibal Horse People that we're always fighting?" / "Yeah, the CHUDs. W-W-What about 'em?" / "Well, don't tell anybody, but I'm working on a bioweapon to use against them, so I got this barrel of horse semen from your mom's hospital and I'm just gonna, you know, subject it to some otherworldly forces."
The sudden inundation from the remnants of Ida transformed familiar scenes of life in New York into otherworldly and waterlogged chaos on Wednesday night.
"David [Bowie] used to say he would sell his soul to be famous," she says. "But he was also otherworldly – and you couldn’t take your eyes off him."
gloss: Of, concerned with, or preoccupied with spiritual matters.
pos: adj
examples: Every religion that becomes ascendant, in so far as it is not other-worldly, must necessarily set its stamp upon the methods and administration of the law.
[Leo] Tolstoy was not a saint, but he tried very hard to make himself into a saint, and the standards he applied to literature were other-worldly ones.
[Simphiwe] Dana has the otherworldly temperament of a mystic.
gloss: Of or relating to the imagination or intellect.
pos: adj
tags: broadly
obsolete
rare
examples: It is easy with the other-worldly gifts to be a schöne Seele [beautiful soul]; but to the large vision of [Johann Wolfgang von] Goethe that seemed to be a phase of life that a man might feel all round and leave behind him.
Related words: otherworld
other world
other-worldish
otherworldism
other-worldness
Derived words: otherworldliness
Translations:
lang: Czech
word: nadpozemský
lang: Finnish
word: ylimaallinen
lang: French
word: d'un autre monde
lang: Georgian
word: არაამქვეყნიური
roman: araamkveq̇niuri
lang: German
word: jenseitig
lang: Greek
word: απόκοσμος
roman: apókosmos
lang: Ancient Greek
word: ἀποκόσμιος
roman: apokósmios
lang: Hindi
word: अलौकिक
roman: alaukik
lang: Italian
word: oltremondano
lang: Italian
word: oltrenaturale
lang: Latin
word: ultrāmundānus
lang: Macedonian
word: оносветски
roman: onosvetski
lang: Polish
word: nieziemski
lang: Russian
word: потусторо́нний
roman: potustorónnij
lang: Russian
word: не от ми́ра сего́
roman: ne ot míra sevó
lang: Spanish
word: de otro mundo
lang: Spanish
word: ultramundano
lang: Swedish
word: utomvärldslig
lang: Turkish
word: yabancı