botch

(bŏch)

tr.v. botched, botch·ing, botch·es

1. To perform poorly or ruin through clumsiness or ineptitude: botch a tennis shot; botch a rebellion.

2. To repair or mend clumsily or ineptly.

1. A ruined or defective piece of work: "I have made a miserable botch of this description" (Nathaniel Hawthorne).

2. A hodgepodge.

[Middle English bocchen, to mend.]

botch′er n.

botch′y adj.

Synonyms: botch, blow¹, bungle, butcher, fumble, muff¹
These verbs mean to harm or spoil through ineptitude or clumsiness: botch a repair; blow an opportunity; bungle an interview; butchered the haircut; fumbled my chance to apologize; muffed the last play of the game.

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

ThesaurusAntonymsRelated WordsSynonymsLegend:

Noun

botcher - someone who makes mistakes because of incompetence

blunderer, bumbler, bungler, fuckup, fumbler, sad sack, stumbler, butcher

incompetent, incompetent person - someone who is not competent to take effective action

botcher

noun

A clumsy person:

blunderer, bungler, dub, foozler.

Slang: screwup.

Idiom: bull in a china shop.

Translations

botcher

n (inf) → Murkser m (inf), → Pfuscher m (inf)

Collins German Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged 7th Edition 2005. © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1980 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1997, 1999, 2004, 2005, 2007

Mentioned in

References in classic literature

He will be as indefatigable in defending our historical edifices as our iconoclasts of the schools and academies are eager in attacking them; for it is a grievous thing to see into what hands the architecture of the Middle Ages has fallen, and in what a manner the botchers of plaster of the present day treat the ruin of this grand art, it is even a shame for us intelligent men who see them at work and content ourselves with hooting them.

View in context

Familiar faces such as Eve Myles, Di Botcher, Steve Meo and Charles Dale all featured, while the scripts refused to pull any punches or shy away from the reality of working class life in south Wales.

Our top 50 homegrown television must sees; TELEVISION TOP 50

Imelda Staunton (NT Live's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf and the Harry Potter films) joins Di Botcher (Sky's 'Stella') Tracie Bennett and Janie Dee as the Follies in this new production.

Looking back on old times

Taking place on Thursday, August 3, the exact location is yet to be revealed but there will be a Q&A with writer and director Kevin Allen and appearances by members of the cast, which includes Rhys Ifans and Llyr Ifans playing the Lewis brothers, as well as Di Botcher as Jean Lewis.

See Twin Towns on a beach

The show's famous faces - Ruth Jones, Di Botcher and Remy Beasley, or as they're better known, Stella, Aunty Brenda and Beyonce - have started shooting series six.

Stella is back as cameras roll on sixth series

"Me and Di (Botcher, who plays Aunty Brenda) were talking, actually, about getting this very Welsh expression, 'there you are', which is used to reaffirm something, into the script, so listen out for that.

Another Stella performance... Five years since Gavin & Stacey wrapped, Welsh actress and writer Ruth Jones is still riding high with a fourth series of Sky1 comedy Stella. JEANANNE CRAIG finds out what's occurring

Its unusually explicit, though permissive, stage directions state that the clown, Bunch the Botcher, comes on stage "with a paire of sheares, a handbasket with a crossebottome of thread, three or foure paire of old stockings, peeces of fustian and cloath, &c." (8) After delivering his introductory comic monologue, "He hangs three or foure paire of hose upon a sticke, and falls to sowing one hose heele and sings" (lines 227-28).

Skills, qualities, and practice

2 Royal Mail botcher Vince Cable intervening in the takeover of a British drugs company by US Viagra-maker Pfizer.

And so to the of the week 5big questions

Ladegaard Bro, Louise, Lotte Bogh Andersen, Anne Bollingtoft, Tine Eriksen, Ann-Louise Holten, Christian Botcher Jacobsen, Ulrich Thy Jensen, Jacob Ladenburg, Poul Aaes Nielsen, and Niels Westergaard-Nielsen (2014), "Leadership Training, Leadership Strategies and Organizational Performance: Designing an Experiment to Test the Causal Effect of Leadership on Performance," paper presented at the IRPSM conference, Ottawa, April, 9-12.

The performance effects of transformational leadership in public administration

The fraud charges were later dropped amid numerous complaints that the UK government's Serious Fraud Office (SFO) had seriously botcher their investigation.

Brothers sue accountants for $4 billion