Home › Glossary › Letter D

Delirious

Disease
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

Want to hear it? Click the Listen button to hear the browser speak the word using text-to-speech!

The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

Characterized by feverish confusion, irrationality, or ecstatic excitation; in poetry, delirious states bridge madness and mystical transport, blending somatic distress with visionary or frenzied insight.

Detailed Definition
Delirious denotes the mental disorientation caused by fever, illness, exhaustion, or intoxication. In poetry, it can portray a speaker whose perceptions have become unstable, so that ordinary objects shimmer, speak, or transform. The word may also carry an ecstatic sense, suggesting joy or desire pushed beyond reason. Used carefully, it creates a threshold between medical crisis and visionary revelation, where the mind cannot fully trust its own senses.
Example
Example in poetry:
The fever made the speaker delirious, so the room seemed to bloom with voices; Delirious birds wheeled above the battlefield, intensifying the scene’s chaos; A poet may use “delirious with grief” for emotion so extreme that it overwhelms reason; The delirious summer heat turned the road into a wavering river of light
Additional Notes
Can describe feverish confusion or ecstatic intensity. Context distinguishes medical delirium from passionate excitement.
Other Meanings of “Delirious”
Also Known As
Raving Feverish
Skip to main content