Did you see that fake intellectuals bookshelf? He doesn't even have an idea of what's in those books on his shelf.
Did you see that fake intellectuals bookshelf? He doesn't even have an idea of what's in those books on his potemkin bookshelf.
Derived from Potemkin village: a village that is just a facade. Just for show. Enter any door and it turns out to be hollow. Totalitarians and dictator types tend to build these in order to impress their oppressed masses or convince the outside that they are a salubrious nation when they are not.
Comes from a legend of Governor Potemkin of Crimea who supposedly created sham villages (Potemkin Villages) to impress his queen from a distance, but this story has been overal refuted by historians.
noun
1. a battleship who's crew mutinied when the tsarist Russia fell
2. a movie made during soviet Russia depicting the mutiny on the battleship Potemkin
adjective
1. a false display of power
2. a pseudo display of control