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nothing doing. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word
nothing doing, but we will also tell you about its etymology, its characteristics and you will know how to say
nothing doing in singular and plural. Everything you need to know about the word
nothing doing you have here. The definition of the word
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nothing doing, as well as those of other words, enriches your vocabulary and provides you with more and better linguistic resources.
English
Pronunciation
Interjection
nothing doing
- (dated, idiomatic, now chiefly India) Absolutely not; definitely no.
1917, William MacLeod Raine, chapter 11, in The Sheriff's Son:"I'll fix his clock all right."
"Nothing doing. I won't have it."
1920, Victor Appleton, chapter 1, in Tom Swift And His Undersea Search:"erhaps you might sell them a submarine or some of your diving apparatus."
"Nothing doing, Ned. We've got other plans."
1946 November 4, “MANAGEMENT: Bundy Saves & Shares”, in Time:he employes of Detroit's Bundy Tubing Co. wanted a raise of 18 1/2 cents an hour. Said Bundy flatly: nothing doing.
2008, Preeta Samarasan, Evening is the Whole Day, →ISBN, page 255:he'd consoled herself with a fresh plan: she'd refuse to go to her father when he came back. Nothing doing, she'd say.
- Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see nothing, doing: nothing that is currently occurring; nothing going on.
1846 October 1 – 1848 April 1, Charles Dickens, chapter 4, in Dombey and Son, London: Bradbury and Evans, , published 1848, →OCLC:"You see, Walter," he said, "in truth this business is merely a habit with me . . . but there's nothing doing, nothing doing. . . . I hardly know where I am myself; much less where my customers are."
1870–1871 (date written), Mark Twain [pseudonym; Samuel Langhorne Clemens], chapter XXIX, in Roughing It, Hartford, Conn.: American Publishing Company , published 1872, →OCLC, page 214:There was nothing doing in the district—no mining—no milling—no productive effort—no income—[…]
1922, Agatha Christie, chapter 11, in The Secret Adversary:I began to think that there was nothing doing, that he'd just come on the trip for his health.
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