point-blank

alternative point blank · alternative pointblank

1. not comparableforensicsVery close; not touching but not more than a few metres (yards).
2. not comparableballisticsThe distance between a firearm and a target where a projectile in flight is expected to strike the centre of the target without adjusting the elevation of the firearm.

   Fifteen of those people had died of natural causes, the rest from gunshot wounds, including point-blank shots, or from shrapnel.

   2022 April 3, Carlotta Gall, Andrew E. Kramer, “In a Kyiv suburb,‘they shot everyone they saw’”, in The New York Times, New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC

   2 more examples

   Now, here's a useful tool—.470, telescopic sight, double ejector, point-blank up to three-fifty. That's the rifle I used against the Peruvian slave-drivers three years ago.

   1912, Arthur Conan Doyle, “‘I was the Flail of the Lord’”, in The Lost World […], London; New York, N.Y.: Hodder and Stoughton, →OCLC

   Heavily armed militants launched a series of coordinated attacks in rural Assam on Tuesday, pulling villagers from their homes and shooting them at point-blank range, witnesses said.

   2014 December 24, “Assam rebels kill scores on night of brutal attacks in Indian state”, in Alan Rusbridger, editor, The Guardian, London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC

3. not comparableDisconcertingly straightforward or blunt; outright.

   a point-blank assertion

   3 more examples

   At this point-blank denial, Stephen turned his face away decisively, and preserved an ominous silence; […]

   1872 September – 1873 July, Thomas Hardy, “‘VII’”, in A Pair of Blue Eyes. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: Tinsley Brothers, […], published 1873, →OCLC

   Yes, but surliness might have provoked a point-blank question.

   1910 August-September, Joseph Conrad, chapter II, in The Secret Sharer, Harper's Magazine

   In recent years, the attitude of the railway authorities towards large-scale visits to works and sheds on the whole, has, happily, veered round from suspicion, and even point-blank opposition, to one of co-operation and ready welcome.

   1951 April, R. S. McNaught, “Railway Enthusiasts”, in Railway Magazine, number 600, page 269

alternative point blank · alternative pointblank

1. not comparableIn a direct manner, without hesitation.

   My father addressed himself to the gentleman point-blank, and there was quite a disturbance.

   1891, Thomas Hardy, chapter XXVII, in Tess of the d’Urbervilles: A Pure Woman Faithfully Presented […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: James R[ipley] Osgood, McIlvaine and Co., […], →OCLC

   5 more examples

   One day, when he was doing some valuation for me, he told me point-blank that clergymen seldom understood anything about business, and did mischief when they meddled; […]

   1871–1872, George Eliot [pseudonym; Mary Ann Evans], chapter XXXVIII, in Middlemarch […], volume (please specify |volume=I to IV), Edinburgh; London: William Blackwood and Sons, →OCLC, book (please specify |book=I to VIII)

   About a week afterwards she said to him, point-blank, "Are you seriously making love to your little cousin?"

   1878 July–October, Henry James, Jr., chapter II, in The Europeans. A Sketch. […], volume II, London: Macmillan and Co., published 1878, →OCLC, page 81

   He was getting on well, so I understood, and had secured a fairly substantial position, and I had therefore ventured to ask him point-blank for the loan of fifty pounds.

   1895, Marie Corelli, The Sorrows of Satan: or The Strange Experience of One Geoffrey Tempest, Millionaire […], 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: J[oshua] B[allinger] Lippincott Company, published 1896, →OCLC, page 12

   Montgomery fired and missed, bowed his head, threw up his arm, and turned to run. I fired, and the Thing still came on; fired again, point-blank, into its ugly face.

   1896, H[erbert] G[eorge] Wells, The Island of Doctor Moreau (Heinemann’s Colonial Library of Popular Fiction; 52), London: William Heinemann, →OCLC; republished as The Island of Doctor Moreau: A Possibility, New York, N.Y.: Stone & Kimball, 1896, →OCLC

   For answer the girl raised her revolver and fired point-blank at him. Without a sound he sank to the earth, dead.

   1913 January–May, Edgar Rice Burroughs, “The Gods of Mars”, in The All-Story, New York, N.Y.: Frank A. Munsey Co., →OCLC; republished as The Gods of Mars, Chicago, Ill.: A[lexander] C[aldwell] McClurg & Co., September 1918, →OCLC