brick wall, n.1
1. (Formerly often written as one word brickwall, or with hyphen, as still attrib.) A wall built of brick.
| c 1440 O. Bokenham tr. Higden in Engl. Stud. X. 18 Enviround abowte with bryke wallis. 1535 Coverdale 2 Kings iii. 25 There remayned but the stones in the brickwall. 1611 Shakes. Wint. T. iv. iv. 818 Set against a Brick-wall. 1753 Chambers Cycl. Supp. s.v. Brick, Brick-walls are also found warmer and wholesomer than those of free-stone and marble. |
| attrib. 1785 Cowper Task iv. 771 That never pass their brick-wall bounds. |
2. fig. An impenetrable barrier. Phr.
to talk to a brick wall, to fail to elicit any response from one's interlocutor;
to see through a brick wall: see
wall n.1 18.
| 1886 H. Baumann Londinismen 16/2 Brickwall: he can see thro a brickwall er kann durch eine Mauer sehen. 1898 Westm. Gaz. 19 July 1/2 We have been putting this dilemma to Liberals and Irish and the answers which we have obtained from both have brought us to what we have called the ‘Irish brick-wall’. 1909 Jerome They and I vii, We mustn't have to tell 'em the same thing over and over again, like we was talking to brick walls. 1936 L. A. G. Strong Last Enemy 309 You're a bit second-sighted, aren't you? I mean you see farther through a brick wall than most? 1963 A. Smith Throw out Two Hands iii. 36 A chain reaction followed of other similarly frustrating brick walls. 1968 G. Butler Coffin Following ii. 58 You still look as if you could see through a brick wall. |