perplex
Americanverb (used with object)
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to cause to be puzzled or bewildered over what is not understood or certain; confuse mentally.
Her strange response perplexed me.
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to make complicated or confused, as a matter or question.
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to hamper with complications, confusion, or uncertainty.
verb
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to puzzle; bewilder; confuse
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to complicate
to perplex an issue
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of perplex
First recorded in 1585–95; back formation from perplexed
Explanation
To perplex someone is to amaze, baffle, bewilder, dumbfound, flummox, mystify, or puzzle them. Perplexing things are hard to understand. If you're perplexed, then you're confused. Different things perplex different people. In football, a tricky defense will perplex a quarterback. Complicated formulas can perplex math students. When people do weird things, it can be perplexing. Anything hard to understand might perplex you. Perplexing also means to make something more complicated. So when you see the word perplex, think "Huh?"
Vocabulary lists containing perplex
List 1
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In a Pickle: Words for When You're in Trouble
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Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
In the ’60s he published a best-seller, The Pooh Perplex, that parodied the most popular strains of literary criticism at the time by applying them to A.A.
From Slate • Sep. 5, 2017
Thanks, Will, for helping me wrap my mind around The Mumford Perplex.
From Slate • Dec. 26, 2012
Never give upMichael Acton Smith had already blown £9m of VC funding on his ambitious but failed alternative reality project Perplex City when he came up with the idea of Moshi Monsters.
From The Guardian • Jul. 22, 2011
For fear the desolation And darkness of thy mind Perplex an habitation Which thou hast left behind.
From Songs from Books by Kipling, Rudyard
Perplex not yourselves," replied he, bluntly, "with so much at once; you will soon be acquainted with all.
From The World's Greatest Books — Volume 01 — Fiction by Hammerton, John Alexander, Sir
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.
