Dictionary

phlegmish en · ADJ

Pronunciation

• (General-American) audio
• /ˈflɛmɪʃ/ (General-American, Received-Pronunciation)
• (Southern-England) audio

Etymology

From phlegm + -ish.

Meanings

1. Laden with phlegm, as a cough.
   • This was plainly apparent with solo piano recordings; it seemed as if a layer of phlegmish tubercular congestion had been removed from between the strings. 2001, Stereophile, volume 24, numbers 7-12, page 123:
   • His front legs doubled under him, and he lay down, his nose in his own water, biting the phlegmish froth and dust around his mouth and gaping like a stuffed animal in a taxidermist's window. 1976, Edward Dahlberg, Bottom Dogs, From Flushing to Calvary, Those who Perish, and Hitherto Unpublished and Uncollected Works:
2. Characterized by the humor phlegm; apathetic or composed.
   • […]'the Lady Pusillanimous' is a mild echo of his invective against his first wife Pamela Lane whom he was just splitting up from: 'That bitch, that pusillanimous, sycophantic, snivelling, phlegmish yokel, that cow — fortunately I've ceased to care what happens to her' — which didn't stop him sleeping with her now and then after he had remarried, nor from supporting her financially 2006, The Spectator, volume 301, page 33:
   • I was raised among them, though I fled their phlegmish company decades ago to join the chattering classes. 2002, Briton Hadden, Henry Robinson Luce, Time, volume 160, page 72:
   • His concern soothed her and she breathed heavily, densely, with a thick phlegmish pity for herself. 1966, The American Writer and the Great Depression, page 292:
   • The example (for the third kind) when the (principal proposition) is separative is: 'Either this fever is either yellowish or scarlet, or this fever is either phlegmish or melancholic'. 2012, Nabil Shehaby, The Propositional Logic of Avicenna: A Translation from al-Shifāʾ: al-Qiyās, translation of original by Avicenna:

Forms

Synonyms

phlegmatic · phlegmy