See ships that pass in the night on Wiktionary
{
"etymology_text": "From a poetic metaphor by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807–1882).",
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{
"ref": "1922, P. G. Wodehouse, chapter 4, in The Girl on the Boat:",
"text": "[H]e sat down and we got into conversation. There wasn't time to talk much. . . . We got along famously. But—oh, well, it was just another case of ships that pass in the night.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "1996 January 7, Isabel Wolff, “Arts & Entertainment: How We Met—Charles Collingwood and Judy Bennett”, in The Independent, UK, retrieved 2013-10-19:",
"text": "We very seldom work together on The Archers, we're rarely in the same episodes, so often we're ships that pass in the night.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "2008, MaryRose Occhino, The Sign of the Dove, →ISBN, page 135:",
"text": "They may have passed each other in the lobby or on the elevator of the building they worked in, but as far as I know, they never had the opportunity to even say hello. They were like two ships that passed in the night.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "2011 July 15, Kim Bielenberg, \"18 holes with the Holywood hero,\" Independent (Ireland) (retrieved 19 Oct 2013)",
"text": "At one point, Gerry McIlroy had two jobs, putting in a 100-hour week as a cleaner and barman, while his mother Rosie worked a night shift in a factory. . . . Rosie and Gerry were like ships that passed in the night."
}
],
"glosses": [
"Two or more people who encounter one another in a transitory, incidental manner and whose relationship is without lasting significance; two or more people who almost encounter one another, but do not do so."
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"(simile) Two or more people who encounter one another in a transitory, incidental manner and whose relationship is without lasting significance; two or more people who almost encounter one another, but do not do so."
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"ref": "1966 February 9, James Reston, “Ships Passing In The Night”, in St. Petersburg Times, retrieved 2013-10-19, page 14A:",
"text": "[T]he central figures in the action seem vaguely unrelated to one another, like ships passing in the night.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "1984, Susan C. Farkas, Changes & Challenges: City Schools in America, →ISBN, page 129:",
"text": "\"Education and business used to be like two ships that passed in the night,\" said Delaware Gov. Pierre duPont.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "1998 October 26, Jennifer Dunning, “In Performance: Dance”, in New York Times, retrieved 2013-10-19:",
"text": "In \"Episode\"—the opening dance—choreography, music, performances and underlying apparent themes looked like ships passing in the night. Nothing connected until a solo danced by a prowling, sensual Christopher Bonomo.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "1999, Janet Duitsman Cornelius, Slave Missions and the Black Church in the Antebellum South, →ISBN, page 68:",
"text": "Ordinarily the missionaries' religion and the slaves' religion were like two ships that pass in the night.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "2009 February 14, Richard Dawkins, \"The Science Show: Interpreting Darwin's theory\" (transcript of interview), abc.net.au (Australia) (retrieved 19 Oct 2013)",
"text": "As a connoisseur of enigmatic titles . . . the Gouldian title that gives me most pleasure is a joint paper, \"Clams and brachiopods: Ships that pass in the night,\" in a learned journal."
}
],
"glosses": [
"Things which have no significant connection or commonality."
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"raw_glosses": [
"(by extension) Things which have no significant connection or commonality."
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"_dis1": "51 49",
"word": "ships in the night"
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"word": "ships that pass in the night"
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"etymology_text": "From a poetic metaphor by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807–1882).",
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"pos": "noun",
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],
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"ref": "1922, P. G. Wodehouse, chapter 4, in The Girl on the Boat:",
"text": "[H]e sat down and we got into conversation. There wasn't time to talk much. . . . We got along famously. But—oh, well, it was just another case of ships that pass in the night.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "1996 January 7, Isabel Wolff, “Arts & Entertainment: How We Met—Charles Collingwood and Judy Bennett”, in The Independent, UK, retrieved 2013-10-19:",
"text": "We very seldom work together on The Archers, we're rarely in the same episodes, so often we're ships that pass in the night.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "2008, MaryRose Occhino, The Sign of the Dove, →ISBN, page 135:",
"text": "They may have passed each other in the lobby or on the elevator of the building they worked in, but as far as I know, they never had the opportunity to even say hello. They were like two ships that passed in the night.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "2011 July 15, Kim Bielenberg, \"18 holes with the Holywood hero,\" Independent (Ireland) (retrieved 19 Oct 2013)",
"text": "At one point, Gerry McIlroy had two jobs, putting in a 100-hour week as a cleaner and barman, while his mother Rosie worked a night shift in a factory. . . . Rosie and Gerry were like ships that passed in the night."
}
],
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"Two or more people who encounter one another in a transitory, incidental manner and whose relationship is without lasting significance; two or more people who almost encounter one another, but do not do so."
],
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[
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"qualifier": "simile",
"raw_glosses": [
"(simile) Two or more people who encounter one another in a transitory, incidental manner and whose relationship is without lasting significance; two or more people who almost encounter one another, but do not do so."
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"examples": [
{
"ref": "1966 February 9, James Reston, “Ships Passing In The Night”, in St. Petersburg Times, retrieved 2013-10-19, page 14A:",
"text": "[T]he central figures in the action seem vaguely unrelated to one another, like ships passing in the night.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "1984, Susan C. Farkas, Changes & Challenges: City Schools in America, →ISBN, page 129:",
"text": "\"Education and business used to be like two ships that passed in the night,\" said Delaware Gov. Pierre duPont.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "1998 October 26, Jennifer Dunning, “In Performance: Dance”, in New York Times, retrieved 2013-10-19:",
"text": "In \"Episode\"—the opening dance—choreography, music, performances and underlying apparent themes looked like ships passing in the night. Nothing connected until a solo danced by a prowling, sensual Christopher Bonomo.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "1999, Janet Duitsman Cornelius, Slave Missions and the Black Church in the Antebellum South, →ISBN, page 68:",
"text": "Ordinarily the missionaries' religion and the slaves' religion were like two ships that pass in the night.",
"type": "quote"
},
{
"ref": "2009 February 14, Richard Dawkins, \"The Science Show: Interpreting Darwin's theory\" (transcript of interview), abc.net.au (Australia) (retrieved 19 Oct 2013)",
"text": "As a connoisseur of enigmatic titles . . . the Gouldian title that gives me most pleasure is a joint paper, \"Clams and brachiopods: Ships that pass in the night,\" in a learned journal."
}
],
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"(by extension) Things which have no significant connection or commonality."
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"word": "ships passing in the night"
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}
Download raw JSONL data for ships that pass in the night meaning in All languages combined (4.8kB)
This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable All languages combined dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-11-06 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-10-02 using wiktextract (fbeafe8 and 7f03c9b). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.
If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.