wastrel

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English

Etymology

1847, waste +‎ -rel (pejorative).[1]

Noun

wastrel (countable and uncountable, plural wastrels)

  1. (countable, dated) One who is profligate, who wastes time or resources extravagantly.
    • 1929, Virginia Woolf, A Room of One's Own, Penguin Books, paperback edition, page 22
      Mary's mother - if that was her picture - may have been a wastrel in her spare time (she had thirteen children by a minister of the church), but if so her gay and dissipated life had left too few traces of its pleasures on her face.
  2. (countable, obsolete) A neglected child.
  3. (uncountable, obsolete) Refuse; rubbish.

Synonyms

References

  1. ^ Douglas Harper (2001–2024) “wastrel”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.

Anagrams

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