A.Word.A.Day --phlizz

A.Word.A.Day

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Aug 5, 2025

This week’s theme
Lewis Carroll

This week’s words
rabbit hole
phlizz
jabberwock
white knight
boojum

Illustration: Harry Furniss in Sylvie and Bruno 1889

A.Word.A.Day

with Anu Garg

PRONUNCIATION:

(fliz)

MEANING:

noun: Something existing only in name: an illusion or empty semblance.

ETYMOLOGY:

Coined by Lewis Carroll in the novel Sylvie and Bruno (1889). Earliest documented use: 1889.

USAGE:

“What was his image of her, but a phlizz, but a fraud?”
John Galsworthy; Silver Spoon; Grosset & Dunlap; 1926.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:

Patriotism is a kind of religion; it is the egg from which wars are hatched. -Guy de Maupassant, short story writer and novelist (5 Aug 1850-1893)

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