If "gormless" means "stupid," then ...

If "gormlessness" means stupidity, to our British cousins, then presumably as you strip the syllables away you find that "gormless" means "stupid" and "gorm" refers to the smarts that are missing when the negatives obtain. Right?

Well ... not exactly. The root comes from Norse "gaum," for heed or attention. We might also, I suppose, call it FOCUS. The implicit diagnosis is that the stupid are those who fail to pay attention. More the Black Adder than Mr Bean.

A recent novel by an Irish writer used the word thus: "I touched my mouth a lot when we talked, It was a childish habit and made me seem gormlesss."

I'm not going anywhere with this. Sometimes this blog is a bit ... unfocused.

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