Dumb and Dumber

In Russian, as in English, it isn’t nice to call someone “stupid.” But sometimes you just have to say it. And, judging by the incredibly long list of synonyms and expressions for people who aren’t the sharpest knives in the drawer, Russians agree. In fact, Russian and English seem to share many of the same images of stupidity.

Russian has four basic ways to describe a person who is or does something dumb: глупый (stupid); тупой (thick); дурак (idiot); болван (blockhead).

Глупый seems to be derived – unfortunately – from глухой (deaf) and can be applied to people, animals, inanimate objects and actions. Мир состоит из умных и глупых, из сильных и слабых (The world is made up of people who are smart and stupid, strong and weak). Он совершает довольно глупые поступки (He is doing pretty stupid things). Sometimes being idiotic is good: Влюблённые глупеют. (People in love get stupid).  

You can also use nouns from this word, глупец and глупыш, or add comparisons for color and zing, like one that we share in English: глуп как гусь (a goose, literally “dumb as a goose”). 

But the affectionate form of the adjective, глупенький, can be almost a compliment: Вы, дорогая, глупенькая ещё, потому что молоденькая (You, my dear, are still foolish because you’re young). 

Another old word is тупой, which is derived from an ancient word for cutting. It seems to have evolved from cut to “thick”— also an English word for dumb — and then “dull” — like a knife (нож тупой) — and finally dim-witted.  Of course, things can be dumb, too:  Мы с Сашей стали eй писать тупые смски (Me and Sasha started to send her idiotic text messages). There are plenty of noun forms of this word, like тупец or тупица (dimwit, male and female), that are similar to English usage: Ты говоришь, что он честный тупец. А по-твоему лучше быть бесчестным остряком? (You call him an honest dimwit. So, in your opinion, it’s better to be dishonest but a wit?)

Дурак (female: дура) (idiot) first meant “wild” or “uncivilized.” It is such a popular insult, it comes in a wide variety of sizes and forms, from the sweet дурачок, annoying дурень, дурик, дурила, to the very annoying дурачище and дурында. Родственники разобрали всё, что было в квартире, пока она сидела на даче, дурында (Her relatives took everything from the apartment while she sat it out at the dacha, the dope).

And then there is болван, which started out life as a wooden block for hats and is therefore aptly translated as blockhead. Sometimes people may be short on smarts but have other talents: У этого болвана оказался замечательный тенор (That doofus turns out to be a marvelous tenor). But sometimes they don’t seem to have any mitigating qualities. Её муж? Болван болваном! (Her husband? Biggest dummy you ever met.)

Or that husband might be балда, originally a bump of a tree or a club, now a blunderhead. We are all stupid from time to time: Вот, балда, как же это я забыл мамин день рождения? (I am such a jughead! How did I forget my mother’s birthday?)

Sometimes we all feel stupid:  Не все дома! (The lights are on but no one’s home, literally “Not everyone is home”); Доходит на третий день (I’m slow to catch on, literally “I’ll get it in three days”). У меня опилки в голове (I’ve got sawdust for brains!).

And on those days when you feel hopelessly dumb, you might even say: Дурак не лечится (There’s no cure for stupid).