blue-pencil

[ bloo-pen-suhl ]
See synonyms for blue-pencil on Thesaurus.com
verb (used with object),blue-pen·ciled, blue-pen·cil·ing or (especially British) blue-pen·cilled, blue-pen·cil·ling.
  1. to alter, abridge, or cancel with or as with a pencil that has blue lead, as in editing a manuscript.

Origin of blue-pencil

1
First recorded in 1885–90

Words Nearby blue-pencil

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use blue-pencil in a sentence

  • Then my secretary types up my material, prints it out, and then I revise using a 0.7 mm blue pencil.

    How I Write: Jared Diamond | Noah Charney | November 20, 2013 | THE DAILY BEAST
  • The prince took up the pamphlet which he had been busy underlining with red and blue pencil.

    Black Diamonds | Mr Jkai
  • Sunday newspaper specials came home with "return" written in blue pencil across the neatly typed page.

    The White Shield | Myrtle Reed
  • He selected the eggs with great care, marking some very choice ones with a blue pencil.

    Toots and his Friends | Kate Tannatt Woods
  • You have not written a single letter since you came here—only a post-card, and that you wrote with a blue pencil.

    Creditors; Pariah | August Strindberg

British Dictionary definitions for blue pencil

blue pencil

noun
  1. deletion, alteration, or censorship of the contents of a book or other work

verbblue-pencil -cils, -cilling or -cilled or US -cils, -ciling or -ciled
  1. (tr) to alter or delete parts of (a book, film, etc), esp to censor

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012