phantasmagorical
1
9.9
- adjective
- /ˌfæn.tæz.məˈɡɔːr.ɪ.kəl/
- Literature
:
fantasmagórico
- In the movie, the protagonist enters a phantasmagorical world where nothing is as it seems and reality bends in unexpected ways.
- a phantasmagorical spectacle
There was a phantasmagorical flavor sweepstakes.
- There was a phantasmagorical flavor sweepstakes.
Examples
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If all of the sound, graphics, and features are the soul of your game, the controls are the door that lets the player in to experience that world in all its phantasmagorical delight.
Blog text (23) -
Her phantasmagorical imagery represents an attempt to subjectivize contemporary empirical understanding of physics and to make it a heroic narrative journey.
Academic text (2017) -
Hope, prohibited for a future that no longer exists, is directed toward the reconstruction of the past, in whose phantasmagorical mythology the significance of its own existence finds an echo.
Academic text (1991) -
As another example, without annotation, Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels would appear largely as a phantasmagorical fairy tale.
Blog text (17) -
The phantasmagorical spectacle that follows illustrates very concretely the delirium and madness that underlie the illusory game of Part One.
Academic text (1993) -
This sister not only triggers the abrupt and atypical reversal of Don Juan's behavior; it also provides the key to understanding the shift from the mimetic spectacle of the first part of the drama to the phantasmagorical spectacle of its conclusion.
Academic text (1993) -
The artist's latest painting features a phantasmagorical landscape filled with swirling colors and dreamlike shapes.
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The festival was known for its phantasmagorical displays, with floats adorned in surreal designs that captivated everyone.
Synonyms
406
5.9
Very strange or unusual in a way that surprises people
81
7.0
Strange like a dream and not real
25
3.8
Strange in a way that seems caused by ghosts or spirits
21
8.0
Very strange and like something made up in dreams or stories
14
8.7
Looks and feels strange and dreamlike, often with bright changing colors
9
5.7
Having a calm, unreal quality as if you are half asleep
6
6.8
Like a dream with strange or impossible scenes that seem unreal
6
7.7
Having very bright colors and strange, swirling patterns
5
8.8
That makes someone see or hear things that are not real
4
7.9
Showing strange, dreamlike images and unreal combinations
1
9.9
Looking like a ghost and seeming unreal
1
9.9
Looks like a strange dream with changing images
1
9.9
Having the strange, unreal feeling of a dream
Being unreal and like a dream
Having a quality like a dream or a ghost that seems unreal
Showing very strange dreamlike scenes with bright melting colors
Very strange in a funny or exaggerated way
Appears like a ghost, not solid or easy to see
Antonyms
How Dreamlike
Surface Forms
Morphology
phantasmagorical = phantasmagoria (opaque) = phantasmagoria + ical
The adjective is formed from the rare noun 'phantasmagoria' with the suffix '-ical', but the base noun and its elements are uncommon, so average learners cannot reliably derive the meaning.
Etymology
Phantasmagorical comes from phantasm (the same root as phantom) meaning 'ghost' or 'illusion', and from phantasmagoria, the name of an old 'ghost show' that used moving pictures and strange lights to make eerie scenes. So something described as phantasmagorical looks like a dream or a ghostly show — full of odd, changing, unreal images.