zapinterjection
Meaning & use
slang (originally U.S.).
- 1.1929–Used to represent the sound of a ray gun, laser, bullet, etc.; also figurative, expressing any sudden or dramatic event.
- 1929
Ahead of me was one of those golden dragon Mongols, with a deadly disintegrator ray... Br-r-rr-r-z-zzz-zap.
in Washington Post 7 May 16/3 - 1962
The jokester, pretending to be a creature from outer space, pointed his cosmic ray gun (finger) at his friend's genitals and exclaimed, ‘Zap! You're sterile.’
American Speech vol. 37 288 - 1967
Shouting idiotic things and going, ‘Whoop,’ ‘Zap,’ and ‘Yap,’ all the time.
, Only when I Larf (1968) xii. 160 - 1968
Bang! Zap! Pow! With laser beams and cracking doomsday machines, the deadly-serious super-heroes.
Maclean's March 77 - 1970
I'm against the war in Vietnam. But I'm not among the people who say let's stop Vietnam, zap.
Daily Telegraph 15 May (Colour Supplement) 34/4 - 1971
Getting down to a blow job, she suddenly produces a razor and zap—the man bleeding and gushing blood, is screaming on the floor.
Frendz 21 May 17/1 - 1974
We have been told..we needn't worry, the sections are not being enforced. Then zap, another homosexual is denied entry for being honest.
Globe & Mail (Toronto) 12 September 7/2 - 1978
The solution receives a positive charge, the truck a negative charge. Zap! The primer and the GMC are joined with a magnetic-like bond.
Fortune 18 December 101 (advertisement) - 1985
A staff meeting will be Wick just shooting out those things one after another—zap, zap, zap.
Parade Magazine 31 March 9
- 2.1969–zap gun nounA ray gun or the like.
- 1969
Billy's will was paralyzed by a zap gun aimed at him from one of the portholes.
, Slaughterhouse-Five iv. 65 - 1976
Plot is subordinated to character exploration, but there's more adventure in that than in many a zap-gun epic.
Publishers Weekly 15 March 59/1 - 1977
New York police have confiscated two space-age ‘zap’ guns from blind singer Stevie Wonder... The guns look like flashlights and fire two darts attached to 20 ft. thin copper wires.
Sunday Sun (Brisbane) 30 January 7/1