Library / English Dictionary

LINGER

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Leave slowly and hesitantly

Synonyms:

linger; tarry

Classified under:

Verbs of walking, flying, swimming

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

go away; go forth; leave (go away from a place)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s
Somebody ----s PP

Sense 2

Meaning:

Take one's time; proceed slowly

Synonyms:

dawdle; linger

Classified under:

Verbs of walking, flying, swimming

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

move (move so as to change position, perform a nontranslational motion)

Sentence frames:

Something ----s
Somebody ----s

Antonym:

rush (move hurridly)

Also:

linger over (delay)

Sense 3

Meaning:

Be about

Example:

Who is this man that is hanging around the department?

Synonyms:

footle; hang around; lallygag; linger; loaf; loiter; lollygag; lounge; lurk; mess about; mill about; mill around; tarry

Classified under:

Verbs of being, having, spatial relations

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

be (have the quality of being; (copula, used with an adjective or a predicate noun))

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

lurch; prowl (loiter about, with no apparent aim)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s
Somebody ----s PP

Derivation:

lingerer (someone who lingers aimlessly in or about a place)

Sense 4

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 "linger" is one way to...):

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

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s PP

Sense 5

Meaning:

Remain present although waning or gradually dying

Example:

Her perfume lingered on

Classified under:

Verbs of being, having, spatial relations

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

persist; remain; stay (stay behind)

Sentence frames:

Something ----s
Something is ----ing PP

Credits

 Context examples: 

Yes, I was there, and lingered for a quarter of an hour or so.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

While receiving less food, mice had fewer memory T cells in their lymphoid tissues, where they normally linger, and more of the T cells in bone marrow that became enriched with fat tissue.

(Memory T cells shelter in bone marrow, boosting immunity in mice with restricted diets, National Institutes of Health)

Meantime the old king was lingering on in daily hope of his son’s return, till at last the second son said, “Father, I will go in search of the Water of Life.”

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

Send a man to the wheel, Mr. Van Weyden, keep this course for the present, and you might as well set the watches, for we won’t do any lingering to-night.

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

But he did linger, debating, over a squat moose-hide sack.

(Love of Life and Other Stories, by Jack London)

But the vision of that first fight still lingered under his eyelids, and as he watched he saw it dissolve and reshape into the series of fights which had followed.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

This was broken by Willoughby, who said with a faint smile, It is folly to linger in this manner.

(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)

I lingered there as long as four days, and was betrothed to them all; for it seemed shame to set one above her sisters, and might make ill blood in the family.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

This, when it was brought to him, he drank slowly, like a connoisseur, lingering on the taste and still looking about him at the cliffs and up at our signboard.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

“CFCs have lifetimes from 50 to 100 years, so they linger in the atmosphere for a very long time,” said Anne Douglass, a fellow atmospheric scientist at Goddard and the study’s co-author.

(First Direct Proof of Ozone Hole Recovery Due to Chemicals Ban, NASA)