English
Etymology
Short for out of the blue sky, likening an unexpected event to lightning or rain coming suddenly from a cloudless sky.
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /aʊt ɒv ðə bluː/
Prepositional phrase
out of the blue
- (idiomatic) Unexpectedly; without warning or preparation.
After I hadn’t heard from her in six months, she called me out of the blue to meet for lunch.
I really can't understand how something like this could simply pop up out of the blue.
2004, Stephen Hume, A Stain Upon the Sea: West Coast Salmon Farming, →ISBN, page 210:I deckhanded on a fish boat for four years and knew no fisherman likes to be called out of the blue and have his numbers demanded!
2011 January 19, Jonathan Stevenson, “Leeds 1 - 3 Arsenal”, in BBC[1]:Just as it appeared Arsenal had taken the sting out of the tie, Johnson produced a moment of outrageous quality, thundering a bullet of a left foot shot out of the blue and into the top left-hand corner of Wojciech Szczesny's net with the Pole grasping at thin air.
Translations
unexpectedly
- Afrikaans: uit die bloute
- Chinese:
- Mandarin: 出其不意 (zh) (chūqíbùyì), 出乎意料 (zh) (chūhūyìliào)
- Czech: zčistajasna
- Danish: ud af det blå
- Dutch: uit het niets, zomaar (nl)
- Esperanto: please add this translation if you can
- Finnish: yllättäen (fi), kuin salama kirkkaalta taivaalta
- French: comme un cheveu sur la soupe (fr) (like a hair in the soup), comme un chien dans un jeu de quilles (fr) (like a dog in a bowling game), de nulle part (fr)
- German: (wie) aus heiterem Himmel, (wie) aus blauem Himmel, (wie) aus dem Nichts, aus dem Blauen heraus
- Hindi: please add this translation if you can
- Hungarian: a semmiből, hirtelen (hu), váratlanul (hu), meglepetésszerűen (hu)
- Icelandic: (like thunder from a clear sky) eins og þruma úr heiðskíru lofti, (like the devil from the sheep's leg) eins og skrattinn úr sauðaleggnum, (as a hard blow) sem reiðarslag, (like thunder from a blue sky) eins og þruma úr heiðríkju, öllum að óvörum
- Italian: inaspettatamente (it), di punto in bianco (it) (all of a sudden), come un fulmine a ciel sereno (like a thunder in a clear sky), dal nulla
- Japanese: 藪から棒, 出し抜け (ja)
- Korean: 갑자기 (ko) (gapjagi)
- Latin: inexspectate
- Lithuanian: lyg perkūnas iš giedro dangaus (like a thunder in the clear sky)
- Maori: matawhawhati, whāia (nei) ka/kua
- Norwegian: ut av det blå, som lyn fra klar himmel (no)
- Polish: jak grom z jasnego nieba (pl), ni stąd, ni zowąd
- Portuguese: do nada (pt) (out of nowhere), da cartola (out of the top hat), à toa (pt)
- Romanian: din senin
- Russian: как гром среди ясного неба (like a thunder in the clear sky), как снег на голову (like snow onto the head)
- Serbo-Croatian:
- Cyrillic: ка̏о гро̑м из ве̏дра не̏ба (like a thunder from clear skies)
- Roman: kȁo grȏm iz vȅdra nȅba
- Spanish: de la nada, de repente (es), de sopetón (es)
- Swedish: som en blixt från klar himmel (sv) (like a lightning bolt out of a clear sky)
- Tamil: please add this translation if you can
- Telugu: please add this translation if you can
- Ukrainian: як сніг на голову (uk) (jak snih na holovu), як грім з ясного неба (jak hrim z jasnoho neba)
- Vietnamese: đang không
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See also