blabber

UK/ˈblæb.ɚ/US/ˈblæb.ɚ/

verbC2Very rare — outside the 30,000 commonest English words, so you will meet it in writing rather than in speechmostly spokeninformal · an editor’s judgement

To blabber is to chatter on and on about nothing. Words without pauses and without much point.

It is informal and disparaging, and it usually takes on. There is a related verb blab, which is sharper and means to give away a secret, so blabbing is a betrayal and blabbering is merely tiresome. Blabbermouth is the noun for somebody who cannot keep anything to themselves. Babble and prattle cover the same ground, and babble suggests even less sense.

Definitions of blabber

1verbblabberTo talk at length without saying anything of substance.C2
“He would blabber on for an hour if you let him.”

Also accepted in games: babble, prattle

Where it comes from

Middle English
blaberen
English, today
blabber

From Middle English blaberen.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in A Man Called Ove

First appears in chapter 5 of A Man Called Ove.

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