Library / English Dictionary

HOVER

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Hang in the air; fly or be suspended above

Classified under:

Verbs of walking, flying, swimming

Hypernyms (to "hover" is one way to...):

fly; wing (travel through the air; be airborne)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "hover"):

poise (be motionless, in suspension)

Sentence frame:

Something is ----ing PP

Sentence examples:

Some big birds hover in the tree

There hover some big birds in the tree

Sense 2

Meaning:

Be suspended in the air, as if in defiance of gravity

Example:

The guru claimed that he could levitate

Synonyms:

hover; levitate

Classified under:

Verbs of walking, flying, swimming

"Hover" entails doing...:

arise; come up; go up; lift; move up; rise; uprise (move upward)

Verb group:

levitate (cause to rise in the air and float, as if in defiance of gravity)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s
Somebody ----s something

Sense 3

Meaning:

Move to and fro

Example:

The shy student lingered in the corner

Synonyms:

hover; linger

Classified under:

Verbs of being, having, spatial relations

Hypernyms (to "hover" is one way to...):

hesitate; waffle; waver (pause or hold back in uncertainty or unwillingness)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s PP

Sense 4

Meaning:

Be undecided about something; waver between conflicting positions or courses of action

Example:

He oscillates between accepting the new position and retirement

Synonyms:

hover; oscillate; vacillate; vibrate

Classified under:

Verbs of being, having, spatial relations

Hypernyms (to "hover" is one way to...):

hesitate; waffle; waver (pause or hold back in uncertainty or unwillingness)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "hover"):

shillyshally (be uncertain and vague)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s

Sense 5

Meaning:

Hang over, as of something threatening, dark, or menacing

Example:

The terrible vision brooded over her all day long

Synonyms:

brood; bulk large; hover; loom

Classified under:

Verbs of being, having, spatial relations

Hypernyms (to "hover" is one way to...):

hang (be menacing, burdensome, or oppressive)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "hover"):

dominate; eclipse; overshadow (be greater in significance than)

Sentence frame:

Something is ----ing PP

Sentence examples:

Some big birds hover in the tree

There hover some big birds in the tree

Credits

 Context examples: 

The neighbourhood, to our ears, seemed haunted by approaching footsteps; and what between the dead body of the captain on the parlour floor and the thought of that detestable blind beggar hovering near at hand and ready to return, there were moments when, as the saying goes, I jumped in my skin for terror.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

Its shrill and piercing cries drew all eyes upon it, and, as it came nearer, a dark spot which circled above it resolved itself into a peregrine falcon, which hovered over its head, poising itself from time to time, and watching its chance of closing with its clumsy quarry.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

If we could fly out of that window hand in hand, hover over this great city, gently remove the roofs, and peep in at the queer things which are going on, the strange coincidences, the plannings, the cross-purposes, the wonderful chains of events, working through generations, and leading to the most outré results, it would make all fiction with its conventionalities and foreseen conclusions most stale and unprofitable.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Martin dispensed royal largess, inviting everybody up, farm-hands, a stableman, and the gardener's assistant from the hotel, the barkeeper, and the furtive hobo who slid in like a shadow and like a shadow hovered at the end of the bar.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

She was a little, sharp-eyed woman, who used to wear, when she was dressed, one unchangeable cap, ornamented with some artificial flowers, and two artificial butterflies supposed to be hovering above the flowers.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

I will hover near and direct the steel aright.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

Sometimes we saw him passing in lonely majesty to his inner sanctum, with his eyes staring vaguely and his mind hovering over the Balkans or the Persian Gulf.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

He then went on to explain that Hindostanee was the language he was himself at present studying; that, as he advanced, he was apt to forget the commencement; that it would assist him greatly to have a pupil with whom he might again and again go over the elements, and so fix them thoroughly in his mind; that his choice had hovered for some time between me and his sisters; but that he had fixed on me because he saw I could sit at a task the longest of the three.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

Amy was taken possession of by Mrs. Lamb, with whom she was a favorite, and forced to hear a long account of Lucretia's last attack, while three delightful young gentlemen hovered near, waiting for a pause when they might rush in and rescue her.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

The first and the mildest course is, by keeping the island hovering over such a town, and the lands about it, whereby he can deprive them of the benefit of the sun and the rain, and consequently afflict the inhabitants with dearth and diseases: and if the crime deserve it, they are at the same time pelted from above with great stones, against which they have no defence but by creeping into cellars or caves, while the roofs of their houses are beaten to pieces.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)