Sunday, January 13, 2013

Louche


Louche

adjective
dubious; shady; disreputable.



Louche adjective \ˈlüsh\

Definition of LOUCHE

: not reputable or decent

<before gentrification, it was the sort of louche neighborhood where people went looking for illegal drugs>
Origin of LOUCHE

French, literally, cross-eyed, squint-eyed, from Latin luscus blind in one eye
First Known Use: 1819
Related to LOUCHE

Synonyms: discreditable, disgraceful, dishonorable, ignominious, infamous, disreputable, notorious, opprobrious, shady, shameful, shoddy, shy, unrespectable
Antonyms: honorable, reputable, respectable

Rhymes with LOUCHE

douche, ruche, squoosh, swoosh, whoosh
Learn More About LOUCHE


louche, adj.
View as: Outline |Full entryQuotations: Show all |Hide all
Pronunciation:  /luʃ/
Etymology:  < French louche squinting, Old French lousche, originally only feminine < Latin ... (Show More)
Thesaurus »

  Oblique, not straightforward. Also, dubious, shifty, disreputable.

1819   Lady Morgan Passages from Autobiogr. (1859) 318   There is some~thing louche about him, which does not accord with the abandon of careless, intimate intercourse.
1850   Thackeray Pendennis II. xxxi. 312   There's something louche regarding him.
1873   G. H. Lewes Diary 16 Jan. in ‘G. Eliot’ Lett. (1956) V. 368   The whole thing appeared louche and unpromising.
1905   G. B. Shaw Lett. to Granville Barker (1956) 53   You could play Snobby. I want a slim, louche, servant-girl-bigamist, half-handsome sort of rascal.
1921   A. Huxley Crome Yellow xvii. 182   There had seemed to be something a little louche in the way she had suddenly found herself alone with Ivor.
1945   W. H. Auden Sea & Mirror ii. 46   A quick cold clasp now and then in some louche hovel.
1945   E. Waugh Brideshead Revisited 236,   I knew of a louche little bar quite near here.
1959   P. H. Johnson Humbler Creation xlviii. 328   As if he were an unfrocked priest due for reception into the world of the louche and the lost.
1970   Times Mar. (Saturday Suppl.) p. iv/6   There is plenty of marvellous delicate comedy and superbly louche menace.
1974   Daily Tel. 14 June (Colour Suppl.) 30/4   His louche greeting, ‘Ladeez and Gentlemen’ was a byword among..BBC Light Programme listeners.

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