pretentiousadjective
uk/prɪˈten.ʃəs/us/prɪˈten.ʃəs/disapprovingtrying to appear or sound more important or clever than you are, especially in matters of art and literature:
a pretentious art critic
The novel deals with grand themes, but is never heavy or pretentious.
Thesaurus: synonyms and related words
Affected & insincere
- affectation
- affected
- artificial
- artsy-fartsy
- arty-farty
- cheesy
- fey
- forced
- glib
- histrionic
- histrionics
- meretricious
- pious
- preciously
- precocious
- pretension
- pseud
- pseudo-
- slick
- theatrical
See more results »
pretentiously
adverb uk/prɪˈten.ʃəs.li/us/prɪˈten.ʃəs.li/
pretentiousness
noun [ U ] uk/prɪˈten.ʃəs.nəs/us/prɪˈten.ʃəs.nəs/also pretension
I couldn't believe the pretentiousness of the book.