Fun with Idioms: Poles Apart

What it sounds like: Two separate poles that have been placed far away from one another.

What it means in conversation: To be completely different; in opposition or disagreement.


If you think of the idiom in terms of geography, it makes perfect sense. The North Pole and the South Pole are exactly opposite one another. There is no way to be further apart than those two geographic locations. Applied figuratively, if two people are in complete and total disagreement they are as far apart as possible, just like the North and South Poles. As in many parts of the English language, we’ve become lazy and dropped the directional indicators so that we just say “poles” and expect everyone to understand that North and South are implied.