Walter Mitty

American  

noun

plural

Walter Mittys

1. an ordinary, timid person who is given to adventurous and self-aggrandizing daydreams or secret plans as a way of glamorizing a humdrum life.

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Walter Mitty Idioms  

1. A person, generally quite ordinary or ineffectual, who indulges in fantastic daydreams of personal triumphs. For example, He's a Walter Mitty about riding in a rodeo but is actually afraid of horses. This term comes from James Thurber's short story, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (1939), describing just such a character.

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Other Word Forms

• Walter Mittyish adjective

Etymology

Origin of Walter Mitty

From the title character of James Thurber's short story “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty” (1939)

Example Sentences

Those behind the Walter Mitty Hunters Club would not speak to me directly - or tell me who they are - but in message exchanges told me they were all ex-service personnel.

From BBC • Jan. 21, 2026

The attorney compared him to Walter Mitty, the character with the boring office job who escapes into elaborate imaginative worlds — a defense Sexton hated.

From Los Angeles Times • Sep. 14, 2025

In short, “Toes” is a Walter Mitty story — a shaggy-dog tale about a man whose wild daydreams are at once a coping strategy and a revelation of his character.

From Washington Post • Sep. 4, 2022

In her work for the 2013 film The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, Greene used antique patterns to outfit Ben Stiller’s character in a 1940s playsuit.

From The Verge • Jun. 20, 2022

“To aging Walter Mitty types like myself, Dick Bass was an inspiration,” Seaborn Beck Weathers explained in a thick East Texas twang during the trek to Everest Base Camp last April.

From "Into Thin Air" by Jon Krakauer

Related Words

• idealist