noun
COLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES
an active imagination (= when someone is able to form pictures or ideas easily )
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Some of the children have an overactive imagination.
fire sb’s enthusiasm/imagination
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stories of magic and adventure that fire children’s imaginations
imagination...run wild
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Be creative – allow your imagination to run wild .
lively imagination (= he often invents stories, descriptions etc that are not true )
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Charlie has a very lively imagination .
overactive imagination
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Such fears are nothing more than the product of an overactive imagination .
overheated imagination
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her overheated imagination
stirring the imagination
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The poem succeeds in stirring the imagination .
the popular imagination
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The characters in the series failed to catch the popular imagination.
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ ADJECTIVE
active
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The camera does not seem to have made the take-over bid for his active imagination that other people record.
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Until now, it has been relegated to sketches by Hollywood types with active imaginations , Elliott said.
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They also gave her a much valued safety-valve for an almost too active imagination .
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Some children with this motor-planning problem may gradually give up their active , organized imagination .
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No, all it has taken is a nice, warm bed and an active imagination coaxing me into a deep sleep.
creative
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The creative imagination reconciles inner and outer worlds in metaphorical synthesis.
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Those are the right touchstones: breadth of mental outlook and creative imagination .
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His piece here demonstrates something insufficiently noted-the way in which his creative imagination informs his acute thought.
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It must involve the total mobilization of the creative energies, imagination and problem-solving capacities of the entire nation.
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How do you utilise your creative flair and imagination ?
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A variety of exercises that draw on the student's own experience and creative imagination .
fertile
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Her fertile and inventive imagination came to her aid.
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And like her own fertile imagination , it shelters any and all images that happen to drift into its confines.
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Even now no-one seems quite certain whether this was a fact, a half-fact or the product of a fertile imagination .
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No one ever turned up such a child, whose existence seems to have been yet another figment of fertile right-wing imaginations .
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Shakespeare has the most fertile imagination of all poets and is more than Homer's equal.
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Artisans needed more than just fertile imaginations and a soft touch with a trowel to bring their work to life.
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They come from Hollywood, they have fertile imaginations .
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He is said to have been convivial, widely knowledgeable, with a fertile imagination and a whimsical sense of humour.
fevered
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It's only my fevered imagination that keeps me warm.
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A solution presents itself: the book will not yield to the hectic temptations, the seductions of the fevered imagination .
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The whole idea was crazy, the result of her fevered imagination .
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She wanted to see if the reality matched her fevered imagination .
great
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My choice didn't show a great deal of imagination but at least Carla would know I'd tried.
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In dealing with the relationship between words and music the author unfailingly reveals both great experience and great imagination .
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Different conditions call for a great deal of imagination on the course, but there are a few basics that always apply.
human
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The potential applications seemed as boundless as the human imagination .
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For an age that put a high premium on human imagination , this was important.
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Future possibilities will in principle be limited only by human imagination .
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What part precisely did Leonardo play in developing the human imagination ?
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It unfolds a theory of how human imagination works.
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Traditionally within the scope of human imagination only gods had wielded such mighty influence on the affairs of men.
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What I believe in is the power of the human imagination .
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This exhibits the powers of the human imagination but it is not at all easy to demonstrate in a book of this size.
little
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But with a little imagination and a flexible approach, it can be fun.
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They were a people of deep religious feeling, but they had little imagination .
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He was always down to earth and had very little imagination .
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Clearly, a little imagination goes a long way.
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Their original intentions were to break up the monotony of the London dance scene and inject a little humour and imagination .
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The aldermen could learn to use a little imagination and finesse.
overactive
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But is there any real evidence that such zodiacs are anything more than the product of an overactive imagination ?
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Are they products of an overactive imagination , or the just aftermath of a plate full of funny mushrooms?
popular
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Even the constitutional principle itself hardly captured the popular imagination .
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The fate of the monastic libraries serves in popular imagination as a classic example of mindless iconoclasm.
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These were the fighting heroes of their day, whose exploits lived long in the popular imagination .
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The otter has captured popular imagination ever since the classics of Henry Williamson and Gavin Maxwell.
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That version suits the authorities, since it plays down an event that has fired the popular imagination .
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It had become associated in the popular imagination with something naive, laughable or downright kinky.
public
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One project that has captured the public imagination is the Trans-Tokyo Bay Highway.
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In the intervening 60 years much had changed in the public imagination .
sociological
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Her sociological imagination blends ideas from experience and the works of great scholars whose works can be read a hundred times.
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The books with the most sociological imagination are those by Addams, Etzioni, and Nisbet.
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In a sociological imagination for the local community, information must have no predetermined subordination to any other set of resources.
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What should be expanded are the principles of thought in Mills's sociological imagination for political analysis.
vivid
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Course Moira always has had a vivid imagination , you have to take what she says with a pinch of salt.
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The Yippies were armed with a vivid imagination to match their rhetoric.
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I know it seems vivid because my imagination fills in all the bits another person wouldn't understand.
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Mark deployed his vivid imagination in a wild-child narrative to create a boy who hunts deer, bears, and birds.
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Although he'd never been blessed with a particularly vivid imagination , Charlie saw it all in an instant.
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A chicken with too vivid an imagination .
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With her vivid imagination , Melissa could visualise the scene and it sickened her.
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Her vivid imagination created some one tall and slim, blonde and attractive.
■ VERB
capture
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The notion of lasers in space has captured the imaginations of planners at the Pentagon and the White House.
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It was the recently completed football stadium that captured his imagination .
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Like Lakoff's book about women and language, it captured the imagination of feminists both inside and outside the academy.
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Small enterprises could capture the imaginations and mobilize the energies of young men.
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The exhibition reveals Andr Citro n's vivid creativity and ability to capture the public's imagination .
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But it was not such language that captured the imagination of the world.
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And it is men and women in relation to each other, and in relation to nature, that really captures the imagination of these drawing-room philosophers.
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More contemporary figures who captured his imagination included Gandhi and Attaturk.
catch
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It catches people's imagination , and becomes, as Harry wanted, a kind of pictogram to represent the whole range.
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The technology has caught the imagination of many.
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Now genetics has become the science that catches the collective imagination as does no other.
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The Berlin airlift caught the imagination of the world.
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Microscopes caught the imagination , as well they might.
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Political hacking is starting to catch the imagination of the Left.
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At the turn of the century Paris caught people's imagination .
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That is one of the reasons why container gardening catches the imagination .
fire
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Commercial speculation rather than the law fired his imagination .
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Her exceptional goodness in executing the humblest and most ordinary of tasks fired the imagination of Catholics everywhere.
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It could have been Hope's unknowing repudiation of the popular notion of black people which fired my imagination .
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The way it was taught did not exactly fire the imagination .
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No, the way to get at it is to work from whatever background has fired your imagination .
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Walt the Wonder Boy, the little lad who fired the imagination of millions.
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But two or three unusual features of last week's cut fired the imagination of New York's conspiracy theorists.
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Seeing those lofty settlements atop the sheer rocks fires the imagination .
lack
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City were content to sit back on their lead, and Newcastle lacked the pace or imagination to break them down.
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But thus far it lacks the imagination and leadership.
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Her play seems to lack imagination and she is manifestly terrified of Keith.
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Both Wellington and Harriett lacked imagination but relied instead on keen observation.
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Ards lacked imagination and drive against an inexperienced Town side, and had a lucky escape in the first minute.
leave
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The Richardsons weren't sophisticated, didn't leave things to imagination .
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The story could become popular only because the outcome was left to our imagination .
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Plastics - that here leave little to the imagination - were widely used in fashion.
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His creation left nothing to the imagination .
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Nothing is left to the imagination .
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That way, the lumps and bumps are left to the imagination .
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How to express approval can be left to the imagination .
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That way they leave things to your imagination .
let
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Yet since leaving Marcus I had let my imagination blow it all up into a Great Romance.
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I would imagine things outside, then I just let my imagination go.
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Other than that, Putnam says, cooks should just let their imagination be their guide.
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When Coleridge got on one and let his imagination run riot, he came up with Kubla Khan.
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He had let his imagination run away with him.
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She had to let imagination take over.
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Just let your imagination run and try to pick up the underlying message. 2.
need
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With Game Boys and other computers you don't need to use your imagination .
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It needs more than will, it needs the imagination to find a way.
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Even where documents are available, historians need a lot of imagination to reconstruct any kind of Carolingian site.
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You needed to use imagination to see through it to the ground below.
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It often needs the imagination and the company of children to help you to appreciate afresh the bird's dazzling beauty.
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Clergy and musicians need to use their imagination as well as their professional skills.
require
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There was some street detritus which required more imagination than most.
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Doing any better than that will require imagination , patience and constant involvement.
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To see it requires imagination , and yet it is not itself the product of imagination.
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It doesn't require much imagination to understand the pain.
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This requires imagination , inventiveness and aesthetic sensitivity informed by historical precedent.
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All this requires imagination , patience, considerable linguistic skill, but above all a rigorous respect for the facts.
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This style of play, though safe, leaves long putts which require imagination and a very confident touch.
stir
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It can also stir the imagination for every parish Sunday and solemnity and right through Eastertide.
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Not much to stir the imagination here.
stretch
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An artificial creature made of metal discs and beads may be stretching the imagination a bit.
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This is not absolutely necessary but it would stretch your imagination and further clarify the entire research process from beginning to end.
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This game will certainly stretch the imagination of D &038; D gamers.
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Now, for a moment I want you to stretch your imagination to the limits.
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Like mathematics, it doesn't only stretch the imagination .
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It is not Venice but it has warmth, colour, and views such as could stretch the most infertile imagination .
use
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The people who closed down Punch. Use your imagination .
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This would be a well-placed lesson to her in how to use her imagination a bit more.
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It is certainly an approach which encourages the lawyer to use imagination in the solution of the problem.
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When the information was slow in coming, the announcers were forced to use their imaginations to fill in the details.
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This means using your imagination and buying some fairly unusual items.
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How can you look at a bunch of stars, so far away, and so incomprehensible, without using your imagination ?
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Now that you feel more relaxed try an exercise using your imagination .
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The aldermen could learn to use a little imagination and finesse.
PHRASES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
a fertile imagination/mind/brain
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Even now no-one seems quite certain whether this was a fact, a half-fact or the product of a fertile imagination.
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He is said to have been convivial, widely knowledgeable, with a fertile imagination and a whimsical sense of humour.
a fevered imagination/mind/brain
a figment of sb's imagination
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These two men actually lived; they weren't figments of some writer's imagination.
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But don't take my word for it; this is not a figment of the journalistic imagination.
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It had vanished as silently as if it had been only a figment of her imagination.
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Nearly three years after work had begun, the dam was still a figment of the imagination.
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Neither one was a figment of his imagination.
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The carpet is a figment of the imagination: an oriental pattern of light and shadow projected on the floor.
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The Ghost of Banquo is more than a figment of Macbeth's imagination: it stands in some way in relation to his conscience.
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The gymslip Lolita is not entirely a figment of the male imagination.
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The ugly rectory is a figment of my imagination, for there was never such a building on Wood Green.
a leap of (the) imagination
by any stretch (of the imagination)
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Raising children isn't easy by any stretch of the imagination.
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All good things but not wildly expensive, not by any stretch of the imagination.
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I am very puzzled as to how either of these two items can be cash flows by any stretch of the imagination.
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It could not by any stretch of the imagination be anything else.
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Management is typically the reason people walk out, but it is not 100 percent by any stretch of the imagination.
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Not that Tiptoe could be called a child, by any stretch of the imagination.
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That is not ` good news' by any stretch of the imagination!
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The program isn't perfect by any stretch of the imagination.
capture sb's imagination/attention etc
catch sb's attention/interest/imagination etc
flight of fancy/imagination/fantasy
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A small, balding academic sort not given to flights of fancy, Kolodney wasted no words as he made his announcement.
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In their more extravagant flights of fancy the choice thus offered to the voter is extended to cover specific heads of policy.
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Many are flights of imagination and, because of the very nature of the area, subjective.
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Other routines are pure flights of fancy, all the more extraordinary for the very ordinary setting.
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Part of the achievement of the visionary comes from inspiration that arises from considering the highest flights of imagination.
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The legend - the romantic flight of fancy was over.
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There are some strange flights of fancy and there are also some extremely down to earth not to say earthy observations.
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This is not a flight of fancy.
vivid imagination
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Although he'd never been blessed with a particularly vivid imagination, Charlie saw it all in an instant.
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Course Moira always has had a vivid imagination, you have to take what she says with a pinch of salt.
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Her vivid imagination created some one tall and slim, blonde and attractive.
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Mark deployed his vivid imagination in a wild-child narrative to create a boy who hunts deer, bears, and birds.
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The Yippies were armed with a vivid imagination to match their rhetoric.
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With her vivid imagination, Melissa could visualise the scene and it sickened her.
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
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Debbie has a very good imagination .
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I don't have a photograph with me so you'll have to use your imagination .
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Jack's vivid imagination often gave him bad dreams.
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Maybe it was just my imagination , but he seemed really hostile.
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Reading is a good way to develop a child's imagination at an early age.
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Shakespeare has the most fertile imagination of all the poets.
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There's no-one knocking at the door - it must have been your imagination .
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
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Dressed in tweeds and constantly pipe smoking, his imagination often ran away with him.
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Each of these views is part of or generated a coherent system, but they are systems fed by imagination .
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In my imagination and nightmares I have done time in an iron lung.
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That this may not be the case in certain instances does not take much imagination to comprehend.
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The gymslip Lolita is not entirely a figment of the male imagination .
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These things belonged to the past moments in which he first envisioned them, images in photographs he took in his imagination .
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This would be a well-placed lesson to her in how to use her imagination a bit more.