Micawber
Britishnoun
"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012Other Word Forms
- Micawberish adjective
- Micawberism noun
Etymology
Origin of Micawber
C19: after a character in Charles Dickens' novel David Copperfield (1850)
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.
As a young, eager-to-please novelist, he had transformed his impecunious father into the whimsical and charming Mr. Micawber of “Copperfield”; after his father’s death came a more selfish and unforgiving version in “Little Dorrit.”
From Los Angeles Times
Could it be that, though we’ve all heard of the great Mr Micawber and Uriah Heep, our understanding of them is formed more by the accumulated memories of performances in TV and cinema?
From The Guardian
Still, she remains a kind of bipartisan Wilkins Micawber, the optimistic clerk in“David Copperfield.”
From New York Times
Mr. Micawber’s formula is simple; reality is more complex.
From The New Yorker
To misquote Mr Micawber: “Something unpleasant will turn up.”
From Economist
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.
