OUTRAGEOUS

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does outrageous mean? 

• OUTRAGEOUS (adjective)
  The adjective OUTRAGEOUS has 2 senses:

1. grossly offensive to decency or morality; causing horror

2. greatly exceeding bounds of reason or moderation

  Familiarity information: OUTRAGEOUS used as an adjective is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• OUTRAGEOUS (adjective)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Grossly offensive to decency or morality; causing horror

Synonyms:

hideous; horrid; horrific; outrageous

Context example:

horrific conditions in the mining industry

Similar:

offensive (unpleasant or disgusting especially to the senses)

Derivation:

outrage (a disgraceful event)

outrageousness (the quality of being outrageous)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Greatly exceeding bounds of reason or moderation

Synonyms:

exorbitant; extortionate; outrageous; steep; unconscionable; usurious

Context example:

unconscionable spending

Similar:

immoderate (beyond reasonable limits)

Derivation:

outrageousness (excessive excess)

 Context examples 

Yet I have seen the same man, time and again, fly into the most outrageous passion over a trifle.

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

“This really grows outrageous, Mr. Blessington,” cried Dr. Trevelyan.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

A more outrageous person I never did see.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

The landlady stood in the deepest awe of him and never dared to interfere with him, however outrageous his proceedings might seem.

(His Last Bow, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Do you mean to tell me that you do not believe in regulating these various outrageous exercises of power?

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

Outrageous as it was to open a leaden coffin, to see if a woman dead nearly a week were really dead, it now seemed the height of folly to open the tomb again, when we knew, from the evidence of our own eyesight, that the coffin was empty.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

You are a private individual. You have no warrant for my arrest. The whole proceeding is absolutely illegal and outrageous.

(His Last Bow, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

These observations, and indeed the greater part of the observations made that evening, were interrupted by Mrs. Micawber's discovering that Master Micawber was sitting on his boots, or holding his head on with both arms as if he felt it loose, or accidentally kicking Traddles under the table, or shuffling his feet over one another, or producing them at distances from himself apparently outrageous to nature, or lying sideways with his hair among the wine-glasses, or developing his restlessness of limb in some other form incompatible with the general interests of society; and by Master Micawber's receiving those discoveries in a resentful spirit.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

Perhaps it was with the hope of narrowing it that she yielded to his persuasions to go to night school and business college and to have herself gowned by a wonderful dressmaker who charged outrageous prices.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

“Never in my life have I been placed in such a situation. It is most improper—most outrageous. I must insist upon some explanation.”

(His Last Bow, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)