Etymology Journal ยท W
What the dickens?
Meaning
- A quaint, slightly old-fashioned way to show shock or annoyance. It sounds polite but conveys that you are genuinely confused.
Vintage, cheeky
Used in a sentence
- What the dickens are you doing with my umbrella?
- I opened the door and the cat ran out. What the dickens?
- What the dickens is that strange sound in the basement?
The backstory
Dickens is an old euphemism for the devil, predating the author Charles Dickens. It has been in use for centuries to add emphasis to a question.
Heard in
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