Possessing the strange, soft, or beautiful unreality associated with a dream.
Reach for it when describing an atmosphere that feels suspended outside ordinary experience
Mist and distant bells gave the empty harbor a dreamlike calm.
| playful | |
|---|---|
| everyday | |
| warm | |
| professional | |
| formal | |
| literary |
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playful
Fits when magical delight is the intended suggestion
Careful Enchanted invents magic or bewitchment not required by dreamlike.
everyday
hazy
Fits when blurred light or memory supplies the effect
Careful Haze alone may be dull and does not create wonder.
everyday
unreal
Fits when disbelief is the simple response
Careful Unreal may praise intensity informally but lacks atmosphere.
warm
otherworldly
Fits when the scene seems to belong beyond ordinary life
Careful Otherworldly can imply supernatural threat.
professional
surreal
Fits when reality feels oddly displaced or impossible
Careful Surreal can be unsettling or absurd rather than gently beautiful.
formal
oneiric
Fits when specialist artistic criticism concerns dreams
Careful The technical word will be opaque to most readers.
literary
Fits when delicate, otherworldly lightness creates the mood
Careful Ethereal is loftier and lacks dreamlike strangeness.
dreamlike quality
Slow film gave the waterfall a dreamlike quality.
dreamlike scene
White blossom covered the moonlit path in a dreamlike scene.
strangely dreamlike
The silent station felt strangely dreamlike after the final train.
Definitions and examples are written for this site. How words are chosen Recording: Vealhurl, Southern England accent, from Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0 Updated
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