something — English Dictionary

Pronoun

1. An uncertain or unspecified thing; one thing.

   Usage

   • indefinite
   • pronoun

   Examples

   I must have forgotten to pack something, but I can't think what.

   I have something for you in my bag.

   More examples (4)

   I have a feeling something good is going to happen today.

   The answer to four down is P something T something Y.

   She looked thirty-something. (anything from thirty-one to thirty-nine years old)

   Seeing the British establishment struggle with the financial sector is like watching an alcoholic who still resists the idea that something drastic needs to happen for him to turn his life around.

2. A quality to a moderate degree.

   Usage

   • Colloquial
   • indefinite
   • pronoun
   • of someone or something

   Examples

   The performance was something of a disappointment.

   That child is something of a genius.

   More examples (3)

   The car has something of a history attached to it.

   Then came a maid with hand-bag and shawls, and after her a tall young lady. She stood for a moment holding her skirt above the grimy steps, with something of the stately pose which Richter has given his Queen Louise on the stairway, and the light of the reflector fell full upon her.

   Christensen, who also edited and co-wrote the film, is becoming something of a specialist in child horror, having launched his feature directorial career with the infant-themed Still/Born in 2017.

3. A talent or quality that is difficult to specify.

   Usage

   • Colloquial
   • indefinite
   • pronoun
   • of a person

   Synonyms

   je ne sais quoi

   Examples

   She has a certain something.

4. Somebody who or something that is superlative or notable in some way.

   Usage

   • Colloquial
   • indefinite
   • often
   • pronoun
   • with really or quite

   Examples

   He's really something! I've never heard such a great voice.

   She's quite something. I can't believe she would do such a mean thing.

   More examples (2)

   Some marmosets are less than six inches tall. —Well, isn't that something?

   Kanye [West]'s speech was...something, that's for sure. As for a best or worst moment? Apparently, it depends on what you think of Yeezy because Twitter was a house divided.

Adjective

1. Having a characteristic that the speaker cannot specify.

   Usage

   • not-comparable

   Examples

   She was so something that she cried all the way home.

   "Very poetic." They came to a halt before the outer door. "It's very something," Rusty said wistfully. "How do you do it?"

   More examples (3)

   "It's very — it's very something," said Lucy. "It's a kind of love-letter, isn't it?"

   If it isn't large, I certainly can't say it's small. But it's very something.

   'How proud they have become,' I said, 'how disobedient. I must say, all in all, it's very something.'

Adverb

1. Somewhat; to a degree.

   Usage

   • not-comparable

   Examples

   The baby looks something like his father.

   Angelo. Yet giue leaue (my Lord,) That we may bring you something on the way

2. Used to adverbialise a following adjective

   Usage

   • Colloquial
   • especially
   • not-comparable
   • in certain set combinations

   Examples

   I miss them something terrible/rotten. (I miss them terribly)

   You can't thrash when you have rheumatic fever – though you want to something awful, Mrs. White says.

   More examples (2)

   Seeing him here, though, I all of a sudden feel more like I been gone from home three years, instead of three weeks, and I miss my people something fierce.

   And then she put the coffin right out on her front porch. Jim told everyone he'd built it kind of roomy since Bobby Lee was on the stout side, but that it better get used quick because sycamore tends to warp something terrible.

Verb

1. Designates an action whose name is forgotten by, unknown or unimportant to the user, e.g. from words of a song.

   Usage

   • Colloquial

   Examples

   More examples (2)

   1890, William Dean Howells, A Hazard of New Fortunes He didn’t apply for it for a long time, and then there was a hitch about it, and it was somethinged—vetoed, I believe she said.

   2003, George Angel, “Allegoady,” in Juncture, Lara Stapleton and Veronica Gonzalez edd. She hovers over the something somethinging and awkwardly lowers her bulk.

   2005, Floyd Skloot, A World of Light “Oh how we somethinged on the hmmm hmm we were wed. Dear, was I ever on the stage?”

Noun

1. An object whose nature is yet to be defined.

   Examples

   More examples (2)

   Yea, ’t is true; I ’d know thee by thine eyen, that are gray, and thoughtful, and dark with a something that lies behind the colour of them,—and shining by the light of a lamp lit somewhere within.

   From the ground, Colombo’s port does not look like much.[…] But viewed from high up in one of the growing number of skyscrapers in Sri Lanka’s capital, it is clear that something extraordinary is happening: China is creating a shipping hub just 200 miles from India’s southern tip.

2. An object whose name is forgotten by, unknown or unimportant to the user, e.g., from words of a song. Also used to refer to an object earlier indefinitely referred to as 'something' (pronoun sense).

   Examples

   What was the something the pilot saw, the something worth killing for?

   More examples (1)

   2004, Theron Q Dumont, The Master Mind Moreover, in all of our experience with these sense impressions, we never lose sight of the fact that they are but incidental facts of our mental existence, and that there is a Something Within which is really the Subject of these sense reports—a Something to which these reports are presented, and which receives them.

   2004, Ira Levin, The Stepford Wives She wiped something with a cloth, wiped at the wall shelf, and put the something on it, clinking glass.