small wonder

English

Alternative forms

• little wonder, no wonder, tiny wonder

Pronunciation

• Audio (General Australian):

  (file)

Noun

small wonder (uncountable)

1. (idiomatic) An event or fact whose cause or rationale is not difficult to discern; an unsurprising occurrence.
   • 1891, F. Marion Crawford, chapter 24, in The Witch of Prague:

     Small wonder if he had loved her for herself, she was so beautiful.

   • 1908 February 19, Jack London, chapter 1, in The Iron Heel, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., →OCLC:

     Small wonder that I am restless. I think, and think, and I cannot cease from thinking.

   • 1910, Rabindranath Tagore, The King of the Dark Chamber, Scene 1:

     Small wonder that you can't believe my words—you who think yourself sage enough to reject the opinions of your parents and superiors.

   • 1929, Edgar Rice Burroughs, chapter 2, in Monster Men:

     That she was beautiful and intelligent could not be denied, and so it was small wonder that she might appeal strongly to any man.

   • 2004 August 16, Jeremy Caplan, “What's Cool In the Pool”, in Time:

     Small wonder the average cost of new pools has leaped past $30,000.

   • 2024 January 10, 'Industry Insider', “Success built on liberalisation and market freedom”, in RAIL, number 1000, page 69:

     In retrospect, it was small wonder that Railtrack found its finances under pressure, as with ever increasing demand there was an inevitable effect on infrastructure renewals. Matters came to a head with the Hatfield accident on October 17 2000, when there was a high-speed derailment as a result of deferred track maintenance.

Usage notes

• Often used as an abbreviated form of the construction "It is small wonder that", as in:

• 1904, Frank Norris, chapter 6, in A Man's Woman:

Small wonder he was excited when the life of his dearest friend was threatened.

Translations

unsurprising occurrence

• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 難怪 / 难怪 (zh) (nánguài), 怪不得 (zh) (guàibude)

• Dutch: geen wonder (dat ...)
• Esperanto: ne mirinde (adverb)
• Finnish: ei mikään ihme, ei varsinaisesti yllätys
• French: pas étonnant (que ...)
• German: kein Wunder (dass ...)
• Italian: non c’è da meravigliarsi (se ...)
• Japanese: …は少しも不思議ではない (…はすこしもふしぎではない, ... wa sukoshi mo fushigi de wa nai)
• Manx: chan yrrys
• Navajo: áyaańda, áyąą
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: ikke så rart (at ...)

  Nynorsk: ikkje så rart (at ...)

• Polish: nic dziwnego, nie dziwota
• Russian: неудиви́тельно, что ... (ru) (neudivítelʹno, što ...), ничего́ удиви́тельного (ničevó udivítelʹnovo)
• Spanish: no es de extrañar [que], no es sorpresa, con razón (es), de razón

References

• “small wonder”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.