wasp-waisted

English

Etymology

Referring to the slender petiole of a wasp.

Adjective

wasp-waisted (comparative more wasp-waisted, superlative most wasp-waisted)

1. Having a very slim waist, especially as a result of tightly-laced clothing.
   • 1969, Doris Lessing, The Four-Gated City, HarperCollins, published 1993, page 33:

     Last week she had opened a door by mistake on a staircase in Bayswater and a woman in a tight black waspwaisted corset, pearls lolling between two great naked breasts, stood by a cage made of gold wire the size of a fourposter bed, in which were a dozen or so brilliantly fringed and tinted birds.

   • 1982, TC Boyle, Water Music, Penguin, published 2006, page 11:

     He strutted down Bond Street with the best of them, decked out in in his top hat, wasp-waisted coat and silk hose.

   • 2011 October 12, Lucy Mangan, The Guardian:

     "Housewife" recalls too strongly the wasp-waisted 1950s figure outwardly thrilling to the latest advances in domestic technology while necking tranquillisers to dull the pain of frustrated ambition.

Related terms

• wasp waist

Translations

having very slim waist

• Bulgarian: с много тънка талия (s mnogo tǎnka talija)
• Finnish: ampiaisvyötäröinen
• Hungarian: darázsderekú (hu)