bright young thing

plural bright young things · alternative Bright Young Thing

1. capitalizedidiomaticsometimesOne who is youthful, clever, eager, and high-spirited in manner and attractive in appearance.

   As a bright young thing—which, it could be argued, is what he remained until almost his dying day—Noël Coward wrote letters filled with effusive glee.

   2007 Dec. 3, Janet Maslin, "Dear Alfred, Gertie and Mummy-snooks: Love, Noelie" (book review of The Letters of Noël Coward ), New York Times (retrieved 22 Aug 2014)

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   Mr. Faggus gave his mare a wink, and she walked demurely after him, a bright young thing, flowing over with life, yet dropping her soul to a higher one, and led by love to anything; as the manner is of females.

   1869, R. D. Blackmore, chapter 10, in Lorna Doone: A Romance of Exmoor

   And even as her pure young voice arose above the screams of the departure whistle, she threw a double back-somersault on the quarterdeck, cleverly alighting on the spikes of the wheel before the delighted captain. "Jingle my electric bells," be said, looking at the bright young thing, "but you're a regular minx—"

   1902, Bret Harte, “Golly and the Christian”, in Condensed Novels Second Series: New Burlesques

   "So you're going back to college in a fortnight," I said to the Bright Young Thing on the veranda of the summer hotel. "Aren't you sorry?" "In a way I am," she said, "but in another sense I'm glad to go back. One can't loaf all the time." . . . How full of purpose these modern students are, I thought to myself.

   1918, Stephen Leacock, “The New Education”, in Frenzied Fiction

   YOUNG COLLEGE MAN, travelled, slightly peeved and irked, not disenchanted, would relish hearing from bright young things with gay outlook, brilliant notions.

   1952 January 14, “The Press: Strictly Personal”, in Time, retrieved 22 Aug 2014

   Charles Wigoder, the 34-year-old chief executive of Peoples Phone, the mobile telephone business, is very much a bright young thing—the kind of businessman who features in magazine articles called '40 under 40', alongside other rising stars who have done unlikely things at unusual ages.

   1994 March 20, Nigel Cope, “Bunhill: Above the crowd without a net”, in The Independent, UK, retrieved 22 Aug 2014

2. capitalizedhistoricaloftenAny of a group of bohemian young aristocrats and socialites in 1920s London.

   A set of youngsters from entitled backgrounds sharing a strong desire to buck against convention, the Bright Young Things included the children of some of the oldest and wealthiest families in England (some of whom still appear in gossip magazines today: the Guinnesses, the Mitfords, the Tenants).

   2016, Eloise Millar, Sam Jordison, Literary London, Michael O'Mara Books, →ISBN

plural Bright Young Things

1. Alternative letter-case form of bright young thing.