swan song
swan song noun: a final performance or accomplishment, especially one before retirement.
Noun
swan song (plural swan songs)
- A final performance or accomplishment, especially one before retirement.
- Yet, on the whole, our good Saint-Pierre is musical, poetical though most morbid: we will call his Book the swan-song of old dying France.1837, Thomas Carlyle, chapter VIII, in The French Revolution: A History […], volume I (The Bastille), London: Chapman and Hall, →OCLC, book II (The Paper Age)
- In no other way can be explained our sacrifices and martyrdoms. For no other reason did Rudolph Mendenhall flame out his soul for the Cause and sing his wild swan-song that last night of life.1908 February 19, Jack London, The Iron Heel, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., →OCLC
- Synonyms:
- farewell performance, last hurrah, final act
swan song meaning in Tamil
swan song in Tamil
- இறுதி நிகழ்ச்சி, கச்சேரி, காட்சி
Examples of swan song in a sentence
- Merkel’s political and scientific sides slug it out in swan song presser [title]2021 July 22, Philip Oltermann, “Merkel’s political and scientific sides slug it out in swan song presser”, in The Guardian:
- [S]pielberg was keen to stress that The Fabelmans is not a full stop: “It is not because I decided to retire, and this is my swan song, don’t believe that.”2022 October 22, Wendy Ide, quoting Steven Spielberg, “‘It’s a way to bring my mum and dad back’: Steven Spielberg on the new wave of...
Synonyms of swan song
- farewell performance
- last hurrah
- final act
Forms of swan song
| plural | swan songs |
|---|---|
| alternative form | swansong |
| alternative form | swan-song |
Origin of swan song
Calque of German Schwanenlied(from Schwan + Lied) or Schwanengesang; from the belief that the mute swan sings before dying.
Questions about swan song
- What does swan song mean?
- Swan song means a final performance or accomplishment, especially one before retirement.
- What is swan song in Tamil?
- Swan song in Tamil is இறுதி நிகழ்ச்சி, கச்சேரி, காட்சி. See Swan song meaning in Tamil.
- How do you use swan song in a sentence?
- Merkel’s political and scientific sides slug it out in swan song presser [title]
- What part of speech is swan song?
- Swan song is a noun.
- What is the plural of swan song?
- The plural of swan song is swan songs.
Words near swan song in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: swan song (page history and authors); swan song (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-au-swan song.ogg.
Cite this entry: “swan song.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/swan_song. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.