Advertisement
Advertisement
spectacle
[ spek-tuh-kuhl ]
noun
- anything presented to the sight or view, especially something of a striking or impressive kind:
The stars make a fine spectacle tonight.
- a public show or display, especially on a large scale:
The coronation was a lavish spectacle.
- spectacles. eyeglasses, especially with pieces passing over or around the ears for holding them in place.
- Often spectacles.
- something resembling spectacles in shape or function.
- any of various devices suggesting spectacles, as one attached to a semaphore to display lights or different colors by colored glass.
- Obsolete. a spyglass.
spectacle
/ ˈspɛktəkəl /
noun
- a public display or performance, esp a showy or ceremonial one
- a thing or person seen, esp an unusual or ridiculous one
he makes a spectacle of himself
- a strange or interesting object or phenomenon
- modifier of or relating to spectacles
a spectacle case
Other Words From
- specta·cle·less adjective
- specta·cle·like adjective
- super·specta·cle noun
Word History and Origins
Origin of spectacle1
Word History and Origins
Origin of spectacle1
Idioms and Phrases
- make a spectacle of oneself, to call attention to one's unseemly behavior; behave foolishly or badly in public:
They tell me I made a spectacle of myself at the party last night.
Example Sentences
This is not high production value YouTube, or YouTube driven by spectacle or personality.
More meta-comedy than action spectacle, it’s the rare superhero story that could potentially appeal to viewers, like me, whose eyes glaze over when battle scenes run longer than a few minutes.
To be sure, the football spectacle changed to accommodate the realities of the war.
Wilkie speculated in an email that Takano was “laying the grounds for a spectacle.”
Signing now would help him avoid a spectacle this season and focus on basketball and his family, which have been his priorities throughout his career.
Even by the already money-drenched standards of American politics, the Eldridge campaign was a jaw-dropping spectacle to behold.
In 1881, along came Bailey, operator of another circus, and two circuses joined to give rise to the first three-ring spectacle.
Had they been in the West Bank, the spectacle would hardly have attracted notice.
The plot of the film runs secondary to the spectacle, and is denser than a TED conference.
Today, the quaint spectacle of a stage-managed fairy-tale celebration strikes many of us as a load of garbage.
In the evening, St. Peter's and its accessories were illuminated—by far the most brilliant spectacle I ever saw.
Thus all about us is the moving and shifting spectacle of riches and poverty, side by side, inextricable.
Children, like uneducated adults, have been known to take a spectacle on the stage of a theatre too seriously.
No one has ever seen so strange a spectacle and I very much doubt if any one will ever see it again.
As pointed out above, the action in a child's play is not intended as a dramatic spectacle.
Advertisement
Related Words
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement
Browse