shrewish

adj

Etymology: From shrew + -ish. Compare Middle English schrewis, shrewessh, shrewyssh (“wicked, malignant”).

1. Of or pertaining to a shrew (a nagging, ill-tempered woman).

   ““For my own part,” she rejoined, “I must confess that I never could see any beauty in her. Her face is too thin; her complexion has no brilliancy; and her features are not at all handsome. Her nose wants character; there is nothing marked in its lines. Her teeth are tolerable, but not out of the common way; and as for her eyes, which have sometimes been called so fine, I never could perceive any thing extraordinary. They have a sharp, shrewish look, which I do not like at all; and in her air altogether, there is a self-sufficiency without fashion, which is intolerable.””

   “Her part. Good grief, he realized; he hadn’t written any dialogue that included her, the slinky, breast-heavy, nipple-dilated female intelligence agent – he had only done scenes between Ziggy Trots and his shrewish wife.”

2. Bad-tempered; ill-natured; obstinate, as a shrew.