irréel

Irréel is a French adjective meaning not real, unreal, imaginary, or fantastic. It is used to describe things that appear beyond ordinary reality, dreamlike, or improbable. The feminine form is irréelle, and the plural forms are irréels and irréelles. The related noun is irréalité, referring to unreality or illusion.

Etymology and usage

The word is formed with the negative prefix ir- attached to réel (real), which itself derives from Latin realis. In everyday language, irréel can qualify scenes, memories, or expectations that lack objective reality. In literature and the arts, it often conveys a mood of otherworldliness, strangeness, or fantasy, sometimes overlapping with but distinct from surrealism or imaginaire.

Distinctions

Imaginatif or imaginaire emphasizes creation by the imagination, while irréel stresses the sense that something does not correspond to reality, whether due to illusion, dream, or counterfactuality. Surréel or surréaliste focuses more specifically on dreamlike or fantastical logic. In philosophical or critical contexts, irréel contrasts with réel to discuss unreality, perception, and the limits of representation.

Examples

Un paysage irréel describes a landscape that feels dreamlike or physically unattainable; des souvenirs irréels refers to memories that seem distorted or not truly real; une expérience irréelle suggests an experience that challenges ordinary notions of reality.

See also

Réalité, réel, irréalité, imaginaire, surréalisme.