warts and all
adverb
No English definition recorded for this entry.
L203525 on Wikidata ↗Wiktionary
adj
Etymology: In 1653, an artist, Samuel Cooper, was asked to paint Oliver Cromwell’s portrait. Cromwell preferred the portrait to be shown with “pimples, warts and everything” (i.e., to include any defects and imperfections). Over time, this phrase has come to be shortened to “warts and all”.
- Of or pertaining to a description or other depiction which reveals the full range of characteristics of a person or thing, including the shortcomings and imperfections.
“Biographer Jones, for all his hero worship, belongs to the warts-and-all school, and notes some strange quirks in Freud's character.”
“More than a quarter of a century after the fraught events that followed the privatisation of the railway, Corbett has provided a warts and all analysis of what led to the spate of rail disasters in the aftermath of the break-up of British Rail, and (ultimately) to the demise of the company.”
adv
Etymology: In 1653, an artist, Samuel Cooper, was asked to paint Oliver Cromwell’s portrait. Cromwell preferred the portrait to be shown with “pimples, warts and everything” (i.e., to include any defects and imperfections). Over time, this phrase has come to be shortened to “warts and all”.
- In a manner which does not conceal shortcomings or imperfections.
“The new crop of reality shows brings us that much closer to the contestants, warts and all.”
“"We are very open and publish everything we investigate in detailed reports - warts and all," adds French.”