A useful picture for fanciful is a head full of shapes that nobody asked for. Something is added that the facts did not supply and the job did not need — an extra curl, an extra creature, an extra step in the story. When that happens to an idea, the idea floats away from what is true. When it happens to a thing you can look at, the thing ends up covered in small invented details.
fanciful 可以想成一顆腦袋裡冒出了一堆沒人要求的花樣。事實沒給的東西被加了進來，做事本來也用不到——多一道捲曲、多一隻怪獸、多一段情節。這些花樣長在「想法」上時，想法就飄離了事實；長在「看得到的東西」上時，東西就布滿了各種多出來的小細節。
From the word’s history
From fancy + -ful, literally 'full of fancy'. The -ful ending is the 'full of' part; what it is full of is whatever the head supplies.
來自 fancy 加 -ful，字面就是「滿是 fancy 的」。-ful 是「充滿…的」那一半；至於裝滿的是什麼，就是腦中自己冒出來的那些念頭和花樣。
Wiktionary etymology_text supplied in this packet ('From fancy + -ful', kaikki:3f6f69a190036ae4:832075235)
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