Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- adjective Likely to snap or bite, as a dog.
- adjective Irritable and curt.
from The Century Dictionary.
- Ready or apt to snap or bite: as, a snappish cur.
- Sharp in reply; apt to speak angrily or tartly; tart; crabbed; also, proceeding from a sharp temper or from anger; also, chiding; scolding; faultfinding.
- Synonyms Touchy, testy, crusty, petulant, pettish, splenetic.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- adjective Apt to snap at persons or things; eager to bite.
- adjective Sharp in reply; apt to speak angrily or testily; easily provoked; tart; peevish.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- adjective Likely to
snap orbite . - adjective Exhibiting
irritation orimpatience ;curt ;irascible .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- adjective apt to speak irritably
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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The country made a huge leap electing a minority president; had at any point Obama gotten snappish or “angry” or remotely threatening, white America would have turned against him in a New York minute, and still would.
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And when I bristle, I get kind of big-brotherly, in the snappish way.
Angry Young Man Chris Lynch 2011
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An unpleasant show about miserable people working in an environment (corporate public relations) that's about as welcoming as Chernobyl, this is the decidedly non-romantic story of newly divorced whiner Alex (Hank Azaria), who cries after sex and any time he hears a certain Archies song, and snappish co-worker Helen (Kathryn Hahn), who drowns her sorrows over her dead-too-soon fiancé, to whom she's turned her home into a creepy shrine.
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This self-referencing, snappish tone tracks with the president's "open mic" comments last week at a Chicago fund-raiser.
Obama's Likability Gap Daniel Henninger 2011
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You may well cry after, or during, this anti-comedy about whiny, snappish neurotics sharing an unbearably smug workplace that's about as inviting as Chernobyl.
Matt's Guide to the TV Week: Closer Finale, CW and NBC Premieres, and More 2011
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Whereas the workplace sex comedy Free Agents, featuring a mopey Hank Azaria and a snappish Kathryn Hahn, looks pretty toxic.
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In her real world, Coraline's snappish mother cleans while her father cooks unappetizing dishes.
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Messrs. Davidson and Slocum were on the point of resolving their perplexity into wrath, as they went down the great stone stairway to the waiting carriage, but Mr. Crockett, the testy and snappish, muttered ecstatically: The son of a gun!
CHAPTER IV 2010
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And when I bristle, I get kind of big-brotherly, in the snappish way.
Angry Young Man Chris Lynch 2011
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And when I bristle, I get kind of big-brotherly, in the snappish way.
Angry Young Man Chris Lynch 2011
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