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Explain vs Mutter - What's the difference?

explain | mutter | Related terms |

Explain is a related term of mutter.


As a verb explain

is to make plain, manifest, or intelligible; to clear of obscurity; to illustrate the meaning of.

As a noun mutter is

.

explain

English

(Explanation)

Verb

(en verb)
  • To make plain, manifest, or intelligible; to clear of obscurity; to illustrate the meaning of.
  • *
  • The boy became volubly friendly and bubbling over with unexpected humour and high spirits. He tried to persuade Cicely to stay away from the ball-room for a fourth dance. Nobody would miss them, he explained .
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2012-03
  • , author=, volume=100, issue=2, page=106 , magazine=(American Scientist) , title= Pixels or Perish , passage=Drawings and pictures are more than mere ornaments in scientific discourse. Blackboard sketches, geological maps, diagrams of molecular structure, astronomical photographs, MRI images, the many varieties of statistical charts and graphs: These pictorial devices are indispensable tools for presenting evidence, for explaining a theory, for telling a story.}}
  • To give a valid excuse for some past behavior.
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-07, author=David Simpson
  • , volume=188, issue=26, page=36, magazine=(The Guardian Weekly) , title= Fantasy of navigation , passage=It is tempting to speculate about the incentives or compulsions that might explain why anyone would take to the skies in [the] basket [of a balloon]: perhaps out of a desire to escape the gravity of this world or to get a preview of the next; […].}}
  • (obsolete) To make flat, smooth out.
  • (obsolete) To unfold or make visible.
  • * (John Evelyn) (1620-1706)
  • The horse-chestnut isready to explain its leaf.

    Synonyms

    * (give a sufficiently detailed report) expound, elaborate

    mutter

    English

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • A repressed or obscure utterance; an instance of muttering.
  • The prisoners were docile, and accepted their lot with barely a mutter .
  • (in Indian restaurants) peas
  • Derived terms

    * mutter paneer

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To utter words, especially complaints or angry expressions, indistinctly or with a low voice and lips partly closed; to say under one's breath.
  • You could hear the students mutter as they were served sodden spaghetti, yet again, in the cafeteria.
    The beggar muttered words of thanks, as passersby dropped coins in his cup.
  • * {{quote-news
  • , year=2012 , date=June 28 , author=Jamie Jackson , title=Wimbledon 2012: Lukas Rosol shocked by miracle win over Rafael Nadal , work=the Guardian citation , page= , passage=This set – the set of Rosol's life – was studded with aces and menacing ground-strokes that left Nadal an impotent spectator often muttering to himself and at the umpire regarding a perceived misdemeanour by his opponent.}}
  • To speak softly and incoherently, or with imperfect articulations.
  • The asylum inmate muttered some doggerel about chains and pains to himself, over and over.
  • * Dryden
  • Meantime your filthy foreigner will stare, / And mutter to himself.
  • To make a sound with a low, rumbling noise.
  • April could hear the delivery van's engine muttering in the driveway.
  • * Alexander Pope
  • Thick lightnings flash, the muttering thunder rolls.

    Synonyms

    * (sense, speak under one's breath) growl, grumble, mumble * (speak incoherently) babble, mumble, murmur, ramble, stutter * (make a low sound) growl, putter, rumble * See also