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slithy

Adjective
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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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

A nonsense adjective invented by Carroll. It suggests something slippery or lithe, but it is not a standard English word.

Detailed Definition
This word is one of the poem’s famous coinages, blending sound and suggestion rather than fixed meaning. In context it helps make the creatures seem strange and hard to picture exactly.
Example
Example in poetry:
“’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves / Did gyre and gimble in the wabe” — Lewis Carroll, “Jabberwocky”; Humpty Dumpty glosses slithy as “lithe and slimy”; the invented adjective fuses sound, motion, and texture before readers know its definition; Carroll shows how nonsense verse can create meaning through context; compare the invented vocabulary of contemporary speculative poetry
Additional Notes
The evidence shows a coined adjective that does not belong to ordinary modern vocabulary.; Found in the poem, Jabberwocky by Lewis Carroll
Also Known As
slithering serpentine sinuous
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