Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
eminence grise
noun
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ The networks set up by De Gaulle's eminence grise, Jacques Foccart, were replaced or strengthened.
Wiktionary
eminence grise
n. (alternative form of éminence grise English)
WordNet
eminence grise
n. (French) a person who exercises power or influence in certain areas without holding an official position; "the President's wife is an eminence grise in matters of education"
Wikipedia
Eminence grise
- Redirect Éminence grise
Usage examples of "eminence grise".
By the early 1970s, Saddam had emerged as the regime's eminence grise.
It showed him standing by a picnic table in a backyard somewhere, tending a barbecue and acting as eminence grise to a crowd of small children, presumably his grandkids.
Bernard Godwin, the Mall's eminence grise, has been our surrogate father, and like disputatious children we've been yelling ''Choose me!