squirm

A twisting, snakelike movement of the body.

Noun

  1. A twisting, snakelike movement of the body.

Origin

First recorded 1690's, originally used of eels; cognate with Scots squimmer (“to wriggle, squirm”). Of uncertain origin. Compare dialectal quirm, whirm (“to disappear quickly, vanish suddenly and mysteriously”), Norwegian kverva (“to turn around, take away, remove, shrink”), from Old Norse hverfa (“to turn, vanish”). Alternatively, perhaps imitative or related to worm (in the sense of writhing movement) or swarm.

Forms

squirms

Verb

  1. To twist one's body with snakelike motions.
    • The prisoner managed to squirm out of the straitjacket.
    • […] around us there had sprung up a perfect bedlam of screams and hisses and a seething caldron of hideous reptiles, devoid of fear and filled only with hunger and with rage. They clambered, squirmed and wriggled to the...
    • "Throw it away, dear, do," she said, as they got into the road; but Jacob squirmed away from her […] - 1922 October 26, Virginia Woolf, chapter 1, in Jacob’s Room, Richmond, London: […] Leonard & Virginia Woolf at the...

    Synonyms: writhe wriggle

  2. To twist in discomfort, especially from shame or embarrassment.
    • I recounted the embarrassing story in detail just to watch him squirm.
    • MARIGOLD: Should I tell them I know? DORA: Nah, let ’em squirm. Let’s go get some pie. - 2010, Jeph Jacques, Questionable Content 1686: Twist in the Wind:

    Synonyms: fidget

  3. To evade a question, an interviewer etc.

Forms

squirms squirming squirmed

Derived

asquirm squiggle squirmage squirmer squirmingly squirmish squirmworthy squirmy