relating to or suggestive of a wasp
easily annoyed or angered
First recorded in 1560–70; wasp + -ish 1
First recorded in 1965–70; WASP + -ish 1
If someone is acting irritable or crabby, you can describe them as waspish. Your sister's waspish complaints about dinner aren't likely to convince your dad to order pizza for her instead. This adjective comes from the word wasp and the notion that wasps are spiteful and ill-tempered, stinging petulantly when they feel cranky. If someone calls you waspish, that's what they mean — you're easily irritated. It's less common than it once was (waspish has been used since at least the mid-1500s), but it's still a great way to describe anyone who's quick to express their anger.
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Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
He was a primary colours politician — waspish, pugnacious, unrelenting, engaging — and at once complicated and undoubtedly controversial, in his politics and his personal conduct.
From BBC ● Oct. 13, 2024
And this was one of the least waspish awards shows in memory, with few jokes at the expense of actors or shows, apart from one about “The Bear” being a comedy without jokes.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 16, 2024
“Umm, yes, a little waspish by my usual standards,” Mr. McManus allowed, sipping his beer and adding with a laugh, “it’s a bit hard to come back from that.”
From New York Times ● Sep. 24, 2021
She dissects many flavors of contemporary delusion and distraction with consummate precision and yet never comes across as waspish or savage.
From Slate ● Jul. 13, 2021
It surprised her how quickly, during reunions with old friends, the subject of marriage came up, a waspish tone in the voices of the unmarried, a smugness in those of the married.
From "Americanah" by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Waspish Author Peyrefitte writes like a countryman of Rabelais and Voltaire, but in the U.S., where there is no comparable tradition of anticlerical literature, he is likely to shock more than to entertain.
From Time Magazine Archive
Waspish U. S. Army pursuit planes rose to greet it.
From Time Magazine Archive
Waspish, 41-year-old Bill Jenner is a small man to use the Senate office chambers once occupied by the late great George W. Norris.
From Time Magazine Archive
He replaces the tall, Waspish dean of Ivy League college presidents, John Sloan Dickey, who is retiring after 25 years of transforming Dartmouth.
From Time Magazine Archive
Some invasion sure it was; For we heard the captains scold; Waspish cavalry a-buzz,— Troopers uniformed in gold, Sable-slashed,—to charge on us.
From Kentucky Poems by Cawein, Madison J.
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
