whirling dervish

noun

, Islam.

1. a member of a Turkish order of dervishes, or Sufis, whose ritual consists in part of a highly stylized whirling dance.

Example Sentences

While I’ve always been intense—a bit of a whirling dervish, as my friends have described me—menopause has made me a stranger to myself.

From Outside Online

Incredibly free and spontaneous-looking, they have a windblown, centrifugal energy, like whirling dervishes, and suggest the zero gravity of Matisse’s late paper cutouts.

From Washington Post

But he was a whirling dervish of energy and could outwork his critics.

From The Daily Beast

The son is a more polished, if less genuine, character than the whirling-dervish, passionate, and even bombastic icon of a father.

From The Daily Beast

Bailey got the job and proceeded to “work like a whirling dervish.”

From The Daily Beast

The room was doing a whirling dervish dance about him, but he still felt it his duty to explain.

From Project Gutenberg

Wasn't it father who was giving the commendable imitation of a whirling dervish on the pier-head?

From Project Gutenberg

If Mr. Talmage had been born in Turkey, is it not probable that he would now be a whirling Dervish?

From Project Gutenberg

He was an advanced kind of religious fanatic, nearly in the foaming stages, something like a whirling dervish.

From Project Gutenberg

If you are still thinking of a career, why not a whirling dervish?

From Project Gutenberg