Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Likely to snap or bite, as a dog.
- adj. Irritable and curt: a snappish tone of voice; a snappish debating partner.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- 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.
Wiktionary
- adj. Likely to snap or bite.
- adj. Exhibiting irritation or impatience; curt; irascible.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Apt to snap at persons or things; eager to bite.
- adj. Sharp in reply; apt to speak angrily or testily; easily provoked; tart; peevish.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. apt to speak irritably
Etymologies
- snap + -ish. (Wiktionary)
Examples
“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!”
“In her real world, Coraline's snappish mother cleans while her father cooks unappetizing dishes.”
“Whereas the workplace sex comedy Free Agents, featuring a mopey Hank Azaria and a snappish Kathryn Hahn, looks pretty toxic.”
“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.”
“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
“This self-referencing, snappish tone tracks with the president's "open mic" comments last week at a Chicago fund-raiser.”
“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.”
“And when I bristle, I get kind of big-brotherly, in the snappish way.”
“The interplay between the performers is lively and very sharp, from the easy, near-constant physical contact between the twins to the verbal deliveries that switch on a dime from singsongy to snappish.”
The Washington Post: Theater review: 'Tether' by Julie Taiwo Oni
“The market is roiling and everyone's a little snappish, especially after a few vacation rain clouds and a couple rum punches.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘snappish’.
-
If You Can't Say Anything Nice
Negative attributes or actions.
biased, cantankerous, caustic, contumacious, dilatory, disdain, duplicitous, fastidious, fractious, glower, haughty, imperious and 22 more...
-
kalidas's Words
crepuscular, mellifluous, ephemeral, diaphanous, zeitgeist, geisterfahrer, infinite, eternal, idyllic, azure, reminiscent, oblivion and 521 more...
-
Miss Sunshine
she's such a joy.
bereaved, bitter, cheerless, dejected, depressed, despairing, despondent, disconsolate, dismal, distressed, doleful, downcast and 405 more...
-
vmarinelli's Words
canard, gumption, inexorable, insouciance, inviolable, mordant, euphonious, sawbuck, carpe diem, pay dirt, adipocere, profligate and 496 more...
-
Sassypants
The qualities of The Diva. Social skills, playful yet bitchy.
churlish, bitchy, cantankerous, peevish, disagreeable, quarrelsome, venomous, grumpy, groachy, crabby, dismal, snappish and 143 more...
-
simple & useful 14
fabrication, parapet, transverse, erecting, dimpled, blistering, epoxy, scrubbable, immersion, puttying, sandpapered, stippled and 65 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for snappish.
Comments
No comments yet...
Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.