"Dull" in other languages?

This email came in to us a few weeks ago. We’re publishing it today, the start of Words Matter Week (which is on our Calendar, click here:

Dear DMC

If my memory serves me well, Dr Johnson said something like this: “Writing dictionaries is dull work”. Well, since I was first acquainted with the Dull Men’s Club, I have been wondering how the word “dull” could be translated into the vernacular idioms of our globalized world.

In French, “terne” would seem to me

the most appropriate translation.

I have since realized that Dull Men & Decent Women belong to all parts. Would the honorable members of the International DMC & DWC be so kind as to contribute by offering their suggestions from their original languages?

Sincerely yours

François Gojat
Wimereux France