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SHREWD
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I. (adjective)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Marked by practical hardheaded intelligence
Example:
he was too shrewd to go along with them on a road that could lead only to their overthrow
Synonyms:
Classified under:
Similar:
smart (showing mental alertness and calculation and resourcefulness)
Derivation:
shrewdness (intelligence manifested by being astute (as in business dealings))
Sense 2
Meaning:
Acting with a specific goal
Example:
the most calculating and selfish men in the community
Synonyms:
calculating; calculative; conniving; scheming; shrewd
Classified under:
Similar:
hard (dispassionate)
Derivation:
shrewdness (intelligence manifested by being astute (as in business dealings))
Context examples:
She was, moreover, very shrewd and clever; and the miller was so proud of her, that he one day told the king of the land, who used to come and hunt in the wood, that his daughter could spin gold out of straw.
(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)
My aunt, though I saw that her shrewdest observation was concentrated on her new guest, had more useful possession of her wits than either of us; for she held him in conversation, and made it necessary for him to talk, whether he liked it or not.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
The vulgar freedom and folly of the eldest left her no recommendation, and as Elinor was not blinded by the beauty, or the shrewd look of the youngest, to her want of real elegance and artlessness, she left the house without any wish of knowing them better.
(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)
When I think of Mortimer Tregennis, with the foxy face and the small shrewd, beady eyes behind the spectacles, he is not a man whom I should judge to be of a particularly forgiving disposition.
(His Last Bow, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
The blows came faster, heavier, more shrewd to hurt.
(White Fang, by Jack London)
Beauchamp struck his opponent a shrewd blow upon the helmet, but was met with so frightful a thrust that he whirled out of his saddle and rolled over and over upon the ground.
(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
But you couldn't get along without masters of some sort, and there arose a new set of masters—not the great, virile, noble men, but the shrewd and spidery traders and money-lenders.
(Martin Eden, by Jack London)
One eye was disfigured and sightless from a wound, but the other looked from my father to myself with the quickest and shrewdest of expressions.
(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
The stone was just broad enough to accommodate, comfortably, another girl and me, at that time my chosen comrade—one Mary Ann Wilson; a shrewd, observant personage, whose society I took pleasure in, partly because she was witty and original, and partly because she had a manner which set me at my ease.
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
In this rough clothing, with a common mariner's telescope under his arm, and a shrewd trick of casting up his eye at the sky as looking out for dirty weather, he was far more nautical, after his manner, than Mr. Peggotty.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
