soap bubble

English

Alternative forms

• soap-bubble

Noun

soap bubble (plural soap bubbles)

1. A very thin film of soapy water that forms a sphere with an iridescent surface.
2. (figurative) Anything that is attractive but insubstantial.
   • 1879, John Campbell Shairp, Robert Burns, London: Macmillan:

     These words so pierce this soap-bubble of the metaphysicians, that we can hardly read them without fancying that the poet meant them to be ironical.

Related terms

• soap film

Translations

sphere of soap water

Danish: sæbeboble c Dutch: zeepbel (nl) c Esperanto: sapveziko Faroese: sápubløðra f Finnish: saippuakupla French: bulle de savon (fr) German: Seifenblase (de) f Greek: σαπουνόφουσκα (el) f (sapounófouska) Hungarian: szappanbuborék (hu) Icelandic: sápukúla (is) f Japanese: シャボン玉 (ja) (shabondama) Korean: 비눗방울 (ko) (binutbang'ul) Mongolian: Cyrillic: савангийн хөөс (savangiin xöös) Norwegian: Bokmål: såpeboble m or f Nynorsk: såpeboble f Ottoman Turkish: قندیل (kandil) Polish: bańka mydlana (pl) f Portuguese: bolha de sabão f Romanian: balon de săpun (ro) n Russian: мы́льный пузы́рь (ru) m (mýlʹnyj puzýrʹ) Slovak: mydlová bublina f Spanish: pompa de jabón f Swedish: såpbubbla (sv) c Turkish: sabun köpüğü (tr), sabun baloncuğu Vietnamese: bong bóng xà phòng

anything attractive but unsubstantial

Polish: bańka mydlana (pl) f

Further reading

• soap bubble on Wikipedia.Wikipedia