wolfishly

English

Alternative forms

Etymology

From wolfish +‎ -ly.

Adverb

wolfishly (comparative more wolfishly, superlative most wolfishly)

  1. In a wolfish way.
    • 1847 December, Ellis Bell [pseudonym; Emily Brontë], chapter 1, in Wuthering Heights: […], volume (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Thomas Cautley Newby, […], →OCLC:
      I […] filled up an interval of silence by attempting to caress the canine mother, who had left her nursery, and was sneaking wolfishly to the back of my legs, her lip curled up, and her white teeth watering for a snatch.
    • 1899 September – 1900 July, Joseph Conrad, chapter XXXVIII, in Lord Jim: A Tale, Edinburgh; London: William Blackwood and Sons, published 1900, →OCLC, page 385:
      He told me he would have roasted their toes rather than be baulked. I believe him. His men believed him too. They didn’t cheer aloud, being a dumb pack, but made ready wolfishly.
    • 1930, Dashiell Hammet, chapter 2, in The Maltese Falcon, New York, N.Y.; London: Alfred A[braham] Knopf, →OCLC:
      Spade grinned wolfishly, showing the edges of teeth far back in his jaw.
    • 1939 April 14, John Steinbeck, chapter 26, in The Grapes of Wrath, New York, N.Y.: The Viking Press, →OCLC, page 394:
      They took the plates. They ate silently, wolfishly, and wiped up the grease with the bread.
    • 2026 February 9, Aaron Timms, “Bad Bunny and jingoism lite: was this the Super Bowl where woke roared back?”, in The Guardian‎[1], →ISSN:
      Roger Federer smiling wolfishly to the crowd: a return to woke?

Translations

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