worlds away
20
6.8
- idiom
- Informal
:
a años luz
- I read those words as I sat in my office in Wellington, New Zealand, a world away from Pakistan.
So the, the experience of an Indian doctor in Harrow is, is a world away from a taxi driver in Bradford, you know what I mean?
- So the, the experience of an Indian doctor in Harrow is, is a world away from a taxi driver in Bradford, you know what I mean?
Examples
-
Brighton was a world away from Cambridge, and he did not know what to expect.
Blog text (18) -
Boston, and everything about it, seemed half a world away.
Fiction book (2001) -
It's so strange to be half a world away from you.
-
I stayed there last week, and it definitely felt like a whole world away from Ocean Street.
Blog text (14) -
The local bus will get you up there, and you will experience a world away from the tourists.
Blog text (25) -
It may only be a few hundred miles to Madrid, but if you let it, it could become a world away.
-
Here, people had been making sacrifices, while he had been isolated, even pampered, a world away.
Fiction book (1999) -
The strike had not gone well, and the successes of the Birmingham bus boycott seemed a world away.
Academic text (1994) -
Her small native village seemed to be worlds away from the violence-plagued, poverty-scourged ghetto she and the children now called home.
Fiction book (1995) -
It's three thousand miles and a world away from where she began.
Synonyms
241
1.0
At a great distance in space or time
218
3.6
Far away from towns and people
110
2.9
Far away in time, long before now or far in the future
45
4.2
Very far away in place or time
34
2.8
Far from here in place or time
15
6.7
In a place you cannot get to easily, often used in stories
13
6.3
Distant places spread over a very wide area
9
4.5
People or things that are very different and have nothing important in common
Antonyms
How Different
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'extremely distant or very different' follows directly from combining 'worlds' (multiple realms/realities suggesting separation) with 'away' (at a distance); the plural world acts as an intensifier of distance or difference. This metaphorical extension is simple and cross-linguistically common, so an average B1 learner who knows the constituent words can infer the MWE's meaning.
Etymology
Worlds away uses the picture of two different planets or 'worlds' to show a very big distance or a strong difference in life or feeling. So worlds and away together mean 'very different' or 'extremely far' from each other.