Word.ws English Dictionary

Walter Mitty

Walter Mitty noun: a sad or pathetic person given to flights of fancy; a daydreamer.

Noun

Walter Mitty (plural Walter Mittys or Walter Mitties)

  1. A sad or pathetic person given to flights of fancy; a daydreamer.
  2. An impostor, especially one falsely claiming to have done military service.

Forms of Walter Mitty

pluralWalter Mittys
pluralWalter Mitties

Origin of Walter Mitty

From the main character in a short story, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (1939), by James Thurber.

Words formed from Walter Mitty

Questions about Walter Mitty

What does Walter Mitty mean?
Walter Mitty means a sad or pathetic person given to flights of fancy; a daydreamer.
What part of speech is Walter Mitty?
Walter Mitty is a noun.
What is the plural of Walter Mitty?
The plural of Walter Mitty is Walter Mittys.

Words near Walter Mitty in the dictionary

  1. walt
  2. Walt.
  3. Waltair
  4. Walter
  5. Walter Mitties
  6. Walter Mitty
  7. Walter Mittyish
  8. Walter Mittys
  9. Walter Plinge
  10. Walterboro
  11. Waltermire

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: Walter Mitty (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.

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Cite this entry: “Walter Mitty.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/walter_mitty. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.