Dictionary

overvivid en · ADJ

Etymology

From over- + vivid.

Meanings

1. Excessively vivid.
   • Henry cleared his throat. That huskiness seemed unconquerable. And his overvivid, quite uncontrolled imagination was playing fantastic tricks on him. 1918, Cosmopolitan 1918-01: Volume 64, Issue 2, Hearst Brand Development, page 43:
   • No one who knew them would have laid an overvivid imagination to the charge of the two worthy burghers who were gossiping thus in the main street of Marseilles; yet this man had strangely impressed them both, and the impression (for which there seemed to be no possible reason) was exactly the same in both cases. 1891, The Peabody Press, Peabody Press for 1891, page 6:
   • A short time ago a Frenchman brought himself to the notice of scientific naturalists by undertaking an exploring tour of the Red Sea, from which he brought back a strange and curious collection of fish and shells, embracing several specimens entirely unknown. Continuing his researches on the coast of France, he assumed a diver’s costume to observe at the bottom of the sea the metamorphoses of certain mollusca impossible to cultivate in aquaria. He was struck with the wonderful beauty of submarine landscapes, and resolved to photograph what he could, since a simple description would savor too much of an overvivid imagination. At first he worked in shallow water with a water-tight apparatus, and the clearness of the water allowed him sufficient light to sensitize the plates. 1895, A. W. Tozer, Current Literature 1895-03: Volume 17, Issue 3, Open Court Publishing Company, page 256:
   • While the worthy doctor regarded his son's efforts in musical composition merely as an outlet for an overvivid imagination, the young Hector found pleasure only in this work, and disgust in the more serious matters of the dissecting-room. 1910, Frederic Stanley Law, Richard Alexander Streatfeild, Life Stories of Great Composers: A Collection of Biographies of the Greatest Masters of Music, page 366:
   • For that overvivid green glow flouted at the argent, pure white glimmer of the “candles of the angels” and drove them from the heavens. Boris Streneski, though, continued to look up. 1911, The Peabody Press, The Smart Set 1911-12: Volume 35, Issue 4, page 75:
   • The composition is conventional. Frank C. Desch’s “Blue and Gold,” a girl looking into a hand mirror. strikes one as being painty, and if the artist had given the mirror an ivory-white back instead of a blue one the picture would have an accent that would have relieved the general monotony of overvivid blues. Why force a note beyond its limits? When you do, you strike paint. 1921, The Los Angeles Times 1921-05-15: Volume 40, Los Angeles Times Communications LLC, page 2:
   • No man, however, can always be wrong, and an overvivid imagination occasionally really portrays. 1907, A. W. Tozer, The Independent 1907-05-16: Volume 62, Issue 3050, Open Court Publishing Company, page 1155:

Forms

Deriveds

overvividly