fight shy

English

Verb

fight shy (third-person singular simple present fights shy, present participle fighting shy, simple past and past participle fought shy)

1. (idiomatic, intransitive) To avoid meeting at a close distance or at close quarters; to keep out of reach, to avoid.

   Synonym: steer clear

   • 1903, Margaret Sherwood, Daphne, an Autumn Pastoral:

     Maybe she is imprisoned there and cannot get out: it would be a terrible fate, would it not, Signorina? Me, I think it is better to fight shy of the heathen gods."

   • 1909, Arthur Stringer, “The Movement in Retreat”, in The Gun-runner, New York, N.Y.: B. W. Dodge & Company:

     "That's worse than useless. He's drunk. And we'll only get him against us, for he'd order us to keep out of the mess. He'd fight shy of entangling alliances. He'd forbid me to send, for he's got his ship to clear from that port."

   • 2015 April 10, Mike Selvey, “Ambassadorial Richie Benaud would always fight shy of criticising players”, in The Guardian‎^[1], archived from the original on 3 June 2015:

     I was struck by the manner in which Richie would always tend towards overstating the skills of players while fighting shy of criticising, as if he felt he was an ambassador for them.

Usage notes

Followed by of to introduce object

References

• “fight”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.