- 1無言的、不用言語的;(歌、影片)沒有歌詞的、無對白的
Wordless means that no words are used. It describes a thing or a moment where meaning passes but nothing is said: a wordless nod, a wordless hug, a wordless look between two friends who both already know.
There are two flavours, and they feel different. The first is simply 'containing no words': a wordless song (just humming or music), a wordless picture book, a wordless film. That one is neutral and factual.
The second is the emotional one, and it is the more common: something happened, and words were either not needed or not possible. A wordless goodbye at the airport. Wordless shock. Here 'wordless' does not mean the person was quiet by choice — it suggests feeling so full that speech fell away. Writers love it for exactly this reason, so the word carries a slightly literary, careful air. In everyday chat people are more likely to say 'we didn't say anything' or 'I was speechless'.
It is nearly always an adjective before a noun (a wordless X). You can say 'she was wordless', but 'she was speechless' sounds far more natural, so most people go that way.
組成word + -less ('without'). The same -less that gives us useless, homeless, careless. It is old: Middle English wordles, and its cousins are still alive across northern Europe — Dutch woordeloos, German wortlos, Danish ordløs.
同家族的字
- speechlesssame -less pattern, close in meaning — but 'speechless' means a person is too shocked to speak, while 'wordless' more often describes the moment or thing
- uselesssame -less suffix, 'without use'
- wordlesslythe adverb built directly on this word
原始詞典資料2 筆記錄
以下是外部詞典記錄的用法，摘錄並精簡格式，我們還沒有寫成教學內容。上面的說明才是我們自己寫的；有些用法可能上面已經講過了。
wordlessadj
- 1
Conveyed without the use of words; unspoken or unsaid.
- On any given Friday night at the Claremont Colleges, between 15 and 20 Jewish students gather to sing wordless melodies, dive into textual study of Talmud or James Baldwin, or hold workshops on antisemitism.
- 2
Unable or unwilling to speak; dumb, silent or inarticulate.
摘錄自 英文維基詞典 English Wiktionary，已精簡格式；依 CC BY-SA 4.0 授權使用，改動後的內容同樣以此授權提供。