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Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
topsy-turvy
adjective
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ NOUN
world
▪ They both show us a topsy-turvy world, a world turned inside-out by the particular lens through which it is viewed.
▪ Yahoo! is the rule, not the exception, in the topsy-turvy world of Internet IPOs.
▪ In the topsy-turvy world of teams and teams of teams, economies of scale are giving way to economies of structure.
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
▪ Ball can look back on a topsy-turvy two years as mayor.
▪ Molly's topsy-turvy bedroom was heaped with toys, clothes, magazines, and books.
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ But things are turned topsy-turvy right enough.
▪ I was quite ignorant of their lifestyle and topsy-turvy habits.
▪ In one topsy-turvy moment, I leaned down to turn Johnny Walker up and nearly ended up upside down.
▪ In the topsy-turvy world of teams and teams of teams, economies of scale are giving way to economies of structure.
▪ The world had gone topsy-turvy ever since he took on this play.
▪ They both show us a topsy-turvy world, a world turned inside-out by the particular lens through which it is viewed.
▪ Yahoo! is the rule, not the exception, in the topsy-turvy world of Internet IPOs.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Topsy-turvy

Topsy-turvy \Top"sy-tur"vy\, adv. [Earlier topside-turvey, topsy-tervy; probably for top so turvy; that is, the top as turvy, as it were turvy; where turvy probably means, overturned, fr. AS. torfian to throw.] In an inverted posture; with the top or head downward; upside down; as, to turn a carriage topsy-turvy.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
topsy-turvy

1520s, "but prob. in popular use from an earlier period" [OED]; compare top over terve "to fall over" (mid-15c.); likely from tops, plural of top (n.1) "highest point" + obsolete terve "turn upside down, topple over," from Old English tearflian "to roll over, overturn," from Proto-Germanic *terbanan (cognates: Old High German zerben "to turn round"). Century Dictionary calls it "A word which, owing to its popular nature, its alliterative type, and to ignorance of its origin, leading to various perversions made to suggest some plausible origin, has undergone, besides the usual variations of spelling, extraordinary modifications of form." It lists 31 variations. As an adjective from 1610s.

Wiktionary
topsy-turvy

a. backwards or upside-down; disorderly; chaotic. adv. backwards or upside-down; disorderly; chaotically.

WordNet
topsy-turvy
  1. adv. in a disordered manner; "they were piled up higgledy-piggledy" [syn: higgledy-piggledy]

  2. in disorderly haste; "we ran head over heels toward the shelter" [syn: head over heels, heels over head, topsy-turvily, in great confusion]

topsy-turvy

adj. in utter disorder; "a disorderly pile of clothes" [syn: disorderly, higgledy-piggledy, hugger-mugger, jumbled]

Wikipedia
Topsy-Turvy

Topsy-Turvy is a 1999 British musical drama film written and directed by Mike Leigh and stars Allan Corduner as Sir Arthur Sullivan and Jim Broadbent as W. S. Gilbert, along with Timothy Spall and Lesley Manville. The story concerns the 15-month period in 1884 and 1885 leading up to the premiere of Gilbert and Sullivan's The Mikado. The film focuses on the creative conflict between playwright and composer, and the decision by the two men to continue their partnership, which led to the creation of several more famous Savoy Operas between them.

The film was not released widely, but it received very favourable reviews, including a number of film festival awards and two design Academy Awards. While considered an artistic success, illustrating Victorian era British life in the theatre in depth, the film did not recover its production costs. Leigh cast actors who did their own singing in the film, and the singing performances were faulted by some critics, while others lauded Leigh's strategy.

Topsy-Turvy (album)

Topsy-Turvy is the debut album by the progressive metal band The Apex Theory, now Mt. Helium. Released on April 2, 2002, it was the band's last release as a quartet, with the vocalist Ontronik Khachaturian leaving the band shortly after the album's release. After attempting to audition for a new vocalist, it was decided that the guitarist Art Karamian would take over as the band's vocalist.

Topsy-Turvy (disambiguation)

Topsy-Turvy is a 1999 musical drama film about the creation of Gilbert and Sullivan's The Mikado in 1884 and 1885.

Topsy Turvy may also refer to:

  • Topsy-Turvy (album), a 2002 album by Mt. Helium
  • Topsy Turvy (Young Fresh Fellows album), 1985
  • Topsy Turvy (Guitar Shorty album), 1993
  • Topsy Turvy (video), a video in the Disney Sing-Along Songs series
  • Topsy Turvy (song), a song from Disney's The Hunchback of Notre Dame
  • Topsy Turvey (The Batman), a first season episode of The Batman
  • Mr. Topsy-Turvy, a Mr. Men character
  • The Purchase of the North Pole or Topsy-Turvy, an 1889 novel by Jules Verne

Usage examples of "topsy-turvy".

High explosive and steel and brass had had their way with the landscape, blowing big holes in the trenches, knocking down stretches of parapet and parados, and incidentally knocking a couple of vital machine-gun positions topsy-turvy.

Those topsy-turvy atoms proved to be nonviable beyond a few millionths of a micro-second, and it gradually became clear that even in this short lifetime the time in which they lived was running backwards.

The pathways to the Living Worlds flowed through an inside out, topsy-turvy universe where there were no suns or planets or inhabitants at all, only shipbound pilgrims who could not stop.

He would delight them equally by his anecdotes of witchcraft and of the direful omens and portentous sights and sounds in the air which prevailed in the earlier times of Connecticut, and would frighten them woefully with speculations upon comets and shooting stars, and with the alarming fact that the world did absolutely turn round and that they were half the time topsy-turvy.

Maia recalled the var-trash romance novel she had read back in prison, about a world spun topsy-turvy, in which stodgy clans collapsed along with the stable conditions that had made them thrive, opening fresh niches to be filled by upstart variants.

Then it was a crash to the carpet and a topsy-turvy shot of Otis Jackson scooping junk bindles off the floor, stumbling to the bathroom, a toilet flushing.

That robbery had been the motive was amply indicated by the topsy-turvy condition of the contents of the three rooms which Baggs called home.

Under a topsy-turvy woolen cap short leaps were now supposed to continue the dance in Kuddenpech's honor: from the fifth position into the demi-plié: petit changement de pieds.

Everything in the room Girk and Baxter had occupied was turned topsy-turvy, but no trace of Dick was brought to light until Tom looked under the table.

The elements must be miles high to be even remotely distinguishable—cantilevered or guyed against the topsy-turvy gravity.

Occasionally, I paused to read a page or so of text for the practice of doing it that way-just in case things stayed topsy-turvy for any great length of time.

Before Mickey Cohen sent the LAPD and Mayor’s Office topsy-turvy with his Brenda Allen revelations--the high brass taking kickbacks from LA’s most famous whores--there had been solid City/County cooperation, pathologists and cadaver caddies sharing plastic sheets, bone saws and pickling fluid.

Their leisured world had been turned topsy-turvy, and their pleadings, prayers and advice availed nothing against the powerful forces sweeping them along.

Though still snoozing at night in the bowl under the light bulb, during the day he gamboled all over the topsy-turvy house, busily inspecting the wreckage of Pacheco's life, the piles of garbage and dirty clothes and rotting memorabilia strewn about.

The large numbers proverbially furnished by astronomy, and the large timespans characteristic of geology, combine to turn topsy-turvy our everyday estimates of what is expected and what is miraculous.