1
: marked by confusion or bewilderment : dazed
… he was fumbling with the sheets, and looking down at them with a slightly bemused expression as though the stuff before him was in a foreign language …—
Robert Penn Warren
Robert Penn Warren2
: lost in thought or reverie
… as distant and bemused as a Professor Emeritus listening to the prattling of his freshman class.—Michael Straight
Michael Straight3
: having or showing feelings of wry amusement especially from something that is surprising or perplexing
This is not another of those now popular books about a bemused outsider's sojourn in rural France, brimming with colorful locals and heart-warming anecdotes.—J. D. McClatchy
J. D. McClatchy
bemusedly
bi-ˈmyü-zəd-lē 
adverb
bē-
Harry looked bemusedly at the photograph Colin was brandishing under his nose.
—J. K. Rowling
J. K. Rowling
Examples of bemused in a Sentence
new federal regulations that the easily bemused should make no attempt to read and understand
Recent Examples on the Web
Then came the World Cup, and for a month, a curious if somewhat bemused country sampled the world’s game up close.
—Los Angeles Times, 7 June 2026
Sweetest children, Granny said, sounding bemused.
—Audrey Schmidt, PEOPLE, 4 June 2026
An utterly delectable novel set in Beirut during and after the Lebanese Civil War, about a 72-year-old translator of Western novels into Arabic, an eccentric steeped in books who shares with us her capacious literary sensibility and often bemused vision.
—Literary Hub, 21 Apr. 2026
That was John’s thing, back then, but leave it to both Beatles to have a bemused sense of class consciousness.
—Chris Willman, Variety, 28 Mar. 2026
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Los Angeles Times, 7 June 2026
Sweetest children, Granny said, sounding bemused.
—Audrey Schmidt, PEOPLE, 4 June 2026
An utterly delectable novel set in Beirut during and after the Lebanese Civil War, about a 72-year-old translator of Western novels into Arabic, an eccentric steeped in books who shares with us her capacious literary sensibility and often bemused vision.
—Literary Hub, 21 Apr. 2026
That was John’s thing, back then, but leave it to both Beatles to have a bemused sense of class consciousness.
—Chris Willman, Variety, 28 Mar. 2026
See All Example Sentences for bemused
Cite this Entry
“Bemused.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/bemused. Accessed 16 Jun. 2026.
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