shrewish

From shrew +‎ -ish. Compare Middle English schrewis, shrewessh, shrewyssh (“wicked, malignant”).

• IPA^(key): /ˈʃɹuː.ɪʃ/, /ˈʃɹɪu̯.ɪʃ/

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shrewish (comparative more shrewish, superlative most shrewish)

1. Of or pertaining to a shrew (a nagging, ill-tempered woman).
   • 1813 January 27, [Jane Austen], chapter III, in Pride and Prejudice: […], volume III, London: […] [George Sidney] for T[homas] Egerton, […], →OCLC, pages 60–61:

     “For my own part,” she rejoined, “I must confess that I never could see any beauty in her. Her face is too thin; her complexion has no brilliancy; and her features are not at all handsome. Her nose wants character; there is nothing marked in its lines. Her teeth are tolerable, but not out of the common way; and as for her eyes, which have sometimes been called so fine, I never could perceive any thing extraordinary. They have a sharp, shrewish look, which I do not like at all; and in her air altogether, there is a self-sufficiency without fashion, which is intolerable.”

   • 1964, Philip K. Dick, “EIGHT”, in Clans of the Alphane Moon, United States: Ace Books, →OCLC; republished London: HarperCollinsPublishers, 1996, →ISBN, page 103:

     Her part. Good grief, he realized; he hadn’t written any dialogue that included her, the slinky, breast-heavy, nipple-dilated female intelligence agent – he had only done scenes between Ziggy Trots and his shrewish wife.

2. Bad-tempered; ill-natured; obstinate, as a shrew.