kill one's darlings
Proposed by a contributor, not yet supported by evidence.
Meaning · English
Remove or sacrifice something precious for the greater good
Nghĩa · Tiếng Việt
loại bỏ hoặc hy sinh điều gì đó quý giá vì lợi ích lớn hơn
Machine-translated — suggest a fix
Literally: kill one's beloved things
Where it’s used:
Used
Widespread English
Examples
The editor had to kill her darlings to meet the word limit
AI-drafted example auto-approved by rule (illustrative, not a corpus attestation)
Sources & notes
Listed in Wiktionary’s “English idioms” category (retrieved 2026-07-29); definition pending editorial review. Definition drafted by AI (@cf/meta/llama-3.3-70b-instruct-fp8-fast) and auto-approved by rule on 2026-07-31; pending editor spot-check.
Common questions
What does “kill one's darlings” mean?
Remove or sacrifice something precious for the greater good Literally: kill one's beloved things
Is “kill one's darlings” formal or informal?
No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.