See Mary Sue in All languages combined, or Wiktionary
Download JSON data for Mary Sue meaning in English (3.7kB)
{
"etymology_text": "From the name of an intentionally over-the-top character in the 1973 Star Trek parody fan fiction A Trekkie's Tale by Paula Smith.",
"forms": [
{
"form": "Mary Sues",
"tags": [
"plural"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {},
"expansion": "Mary Sue (plural Mary Sues)",
"name": "en-noun"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "noun",
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
"parents": [
"Entries with incorrect language header",
"Entry maintenance"
],
"source": "w"
},
{
"kind": "topical",
"langcode": "en",
"name": "Fan fiction",
"orig": "en:Fan fiction",
"parents": [
"Fandom",
"Fiction",
"Literature",
"Culture",
"Artistic works",
"Entertainment",
"Writing",
"Society",
"Art",
"Human behaviour",
"Language",
"All topics",
"Human",
"Communication",
"Fundamental"
],
"source": "w"
},
{
"kind": "topical",
"langcode": "en",
"name": "Narratology",
"orig": "en:Narratology",
"parents": [
"Drama",
"Literature",
"Theater",
"Culture",
"Entertainment",
"Writing",
"Art",
"Society",
"Human behaviour",
"Language",
"All topics",
"Human",
"Communication",
"Fundamental"
],
"source": "w"
},
{
"kind": "topical",
"langcode": "en",
"name": "Plot devices",
"orig": "en:Plot devices",
"parents": [
"Fiction",
"Narratology",
"Artistic works",
"Drama",
"Literature",
"Art",
"Theater",
"Culture",
"Entertainment",
"Writing",
"Society",
"Human behaviour",
"Language",
"All topics",
"Human",
"Communication",
"Fundamental"
],
"source": "w"
},
{
"kind": "topical",
"langcode": "en",
"name": "Stock characters",
"orig": "en:Stock characters",
"parents": [
"Fictional characters",
"Fiction",
"Artistic works",
"Art",
"Culture",
"Society",
"All topics",
"Fundamental"
],
"source": "w"
}
],
"derived": [
{
"word": "Mary Sueish"
},
{
"word": "Sueish"
},
{
"word": "Suethor"
}
],
"examples": [
{
"ref": "2010 August 3, Ta-Nehisi Coates, “A Whole New World”, in The Atlantic",
"text": "Bella may be a Mary Sue, but if we don't identify with her, and even if we do, there's no other interpretive place for us in the universe.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2015 January 20, Sian Cain, “Why a non-white Nancy Drew could be amazing”, in The Guardian",
"text": "She was a mashup of ideals that made her feel very fake; a Mary Sue who was popular, pretty, athletic, artistic, all the while loved by everyone who met her.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2015 December 19, Tasha Robinson, “With Star Wars' Rey, we've reached Peak Strong Female Character”, in The Verge",
"text": "So here's a radical suggestion: instead of being concerned about whether her Mary Sue flawlessness is a problem, why not, just this once, enjoy it for what it is?",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2022 August 18, Dan Shive, El Goonish Shive - EGS:NP (webcomic), Comic for Thursday, Aug 18, 2022",
"text": "There is one, and only one, previously unheard of flaw that keeps Nanase from being the merriest of Mary Sues. That flaw is...",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"A fictional character, usually female, whose implausible talents and likeability weaken the story."
],
"hyponyms": [
{
"word": "Gary Stu"
},
{
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "Marty Stu"
}
],
"id": "en-Mary_Sue-en-noun-gOh79J6V",
"links": [
[
"fandom",
"fandom"
],
[
"slang",
"slang"
],
[
"derogatory",
"derogatory"
],
[
"fictional",
"fictional"
],
[
"character",
"character"
],
[
"female",
"female"
],
[
"implausible",
"implausible"
],
[
"talent",
"talent"
],
[
"likeability",
"likeability"
],
[
"story",
"story"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(fandom slang, usually derogatory) A fictional character, usually female, whose implausible talents and likeability weaken the story."
],
"related": [
{
"word": "self-insert"
}
],
"synonyms": [
{
"word": "Sue"
}
],
"tags": [
"derogatory",
"slang",
"usually"
],
"topics": [
"lifestyle"
],
"wikipedia": [
"Mary Sue"
]
}
],
"word": "Mary Sue"
}
{
"derived": [
{
"word": "Mary Sueish"
},
{
"word": "Sueish"
},
{
"word": "Suethor"
}
],
"etymology_text": "From the name of an intentionally over-the-top character in the 1973 Star Trek parody fan fiction A Trekkie's Tale by Paula Smith.",
"forms": [
{
"form": "Mary Sues",
"tags": [
"plural"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {},
"expansion": "Mary Sue (plural Mary Sues)",
"name": "en-noun"
}
],
"hyponyms": [
{
"word": "Gary Stu"
},
{
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "Marty Stu"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "noun",
"related": [
{
"word": "self-insert"
}
],
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
"English countable nouns",
"English derogatory terms",
"English entries with incorrect language header",
"English fandom slang",
"English lemmas",
"English multiword terms",
"English nouns",
"English terms with quotations",
"en:Fan fiction",
"en:Narratology",
"en:Plot devices",
"en:Stock characters"
],
"examples": [
{
"ref": "2010 August 3, Ta-Nehisi Coates, “A Whole New World”, in The Atlantic",
"text": "Bella may be a Mary Sue, but if we don't identify with her, and even if we do, there's no other interpretive place for us in the universe.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2015 January 20, Sian Cain, “Why a non-white Nancy Drew could be amazing”, in The Guardian",
"text": "She was a mashup of ideals that made her feel very fake; a Mary Sue who was popular, pretty, athletic, artistic, all the while loved by everyone who met her.",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2015 December 19, Tasha Robinson, “With Star Wars' Rey, we've reached Peak Strong Female Character”, in The Verge",
"text": "So here's a radical suggestion: instead of being concerned about whether her Mary Sue flawlessness is a problem, why not, just this once, enjoy it for what it is?",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"ref": "2022 August 18, Dan Shive, El Goonish Shive - EGS:NP (webcomic), Comic for Thursday, Aug 18, 2022",
"text": "There is one, and only one, previously unheard of flaw that keeps Nanase from being the merriest of Mary Sues. That flaw is...",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"A fictional character, usually female, whose implausible talents and likeability weaken the story."
],
"links": [
[
"fandom",
"fandom"
],
[
"slang",
"slang"
],
[
"derogatory",
"derogatory"
],
[
"fictional",
"fictional"
],
[
"character",
"character"
],
[
"female",
"female"
],
[
"implausible",
"implausible"
],
[
"talent",
"talent"
],
[
"likeability",
"likeability"
],
[
"story",
"story"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(fandom slang, usually derogatory) A fictional character, usually female, whose implausible talents and likeability weaken the story."
],
"synonyms": [
{
"word": "Sue"
}
],
"tags": [
"derogatory",
"slang",
"usually"
],
"topics": [
"lifestyle"
],
"wikipedia": [
"Mary Sue"
]
}
],
"word": "Mary Sue"
}
This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-06 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-05-02 using wiktextract (f4fd8c9 and c9440ce). 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.