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WAN
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
Irregular inflected forms: wanned , wanner , wannest , wanning
I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
A computer network that spans a wider area than does a local area network
Synonyms:
WAN; wide area network
Classified under:
Nouns denoting man-made objects
Hypernyms ("WAN" is a kind of...):
computer network ((computer science) a network of computers)
II. (adjective)
Comparative and superlative
Comparative: wanner
Superlative: wannest
Sense 1
Meaning:
Lacking vitality as from weariness or illness or unhappiness
Example:
a wan smile
Classified under:
Similar:
unanimated (not animated or enlivened; dull)
Sense 2
Meaning:
Abnormally deficient in color as suggesting physical or emotional distress
Example:
her wan face suddenly flushed
Synonyms:
Classified under:
Similar:
colorless; colourless (weak in color; not colorful)
Derivation:
wanness (unnatural lack of color in the skin (as from bruising or sickness or emotional distress))
Sense 3
Meaning:
(of light) lacking in intensity or brightness; dim or feeble
Example:
the wan light of dawn
Synonyms:
pale; pallid; sick; wan
Classified under:
Similar:
weak (wanting in physical strength)
III. (verb)
Verb forms
Present simple: I / you / we / they wan ... he / she / it wans
Past simple: wanned
Past participle: wanned
-ing form: wanning
Sense 1
Meaning:
Become pale and sickly
Classified under:
Verbs of grooming, dressing and bodily care
Hypernyms (to "wan" is one way to...):
Sentence frame:
Somebody ----s
Context examples:
Only within the folds of a shroud have I ever seen so wan a face.
(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
I, who knew him well, could tell from his wan cheeks and his restless fingers that he was at his wit’s ends what to do; but no stranger who observed his jaunty bearing, the flecking of his laced handkerchief, the handling of his quizzing glass, or the shooting of his ruffles, would ever have thought that this butterfly creature could have had a care upon earth.
(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
"Now you're started on the subject," she answered with a wan smile. "Well,—he told me once he was an Oxford man."
(The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald)
Her wan, scornful mouth smiled and so I drew her up again, closer, this time to my face.
(The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald)
Her grey sun-strained eyes looked back at me with polite reciprocal curiosity out of a wan, charming discontented face.
(The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald)
As we passed over the dark bridge her wan face fell lazily against my coat's shoulder and the formidable stroke of thirty died away with the reassuring pressure of her hand.
(The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald)
