Definitions

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective superlative form of keen: most keen.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • Williamson, A. B., held him to the point: "I also was called the keenest student of my time," said he; "but it isn't bringing you patients."

    Stanford Stories Tales of a Young University Will Irwin 1910

  • The delight of genius in the act of composition has been called the keenest of intellectual pleasures; and this was the poet's almost sole reward in Canada a generation ago, when nothing seemed to catch the popular ear but burlesque, or trivial verse.

    The Moccasin Maker E. Pauline Johnson 1887

  • The keenest was the man who ran the US-sponsored Poppy Eradication Programme PEP in Helmand, Charles Bennett.

    An Ordinary Soldier Doug Beattie MC With Philip Gomm 2008

  • This besides many other things, that Nature has appointed us men to be no base nor ignoble animals; but when she ushers us into life and into the vast universe as into some great assembly, to be as it were spectators of the mighty whole and the keenest aspirants for honour, forthwith she implants in our souls the unconquerable love of whatever is elevated and more divine than we.

    On the Sublime Hal Duncan 2010

  • This is the party that considers Judd Gregg “one of the keenest fiscal minds on Capitol Hill”, and, as Yglesias knows, thinks of Mike Pence and Eric Cantor as policy intellectuals.

    Matthew Yglesias » Maybe Ben Bernanke is a Conservative Republican 2010

  • Jerry, ever keenest on the hunting, had ranged farther afield than Michael as the pair of them accompanied Harley Kennan on his early morning ride.

    CHAPTER XXXVI 2010

  • "Joy," his latest-born, completed the day before and tossed into the corner for lack of stamps, won his keenest approbation.

    Chapter 16 2010

  • As Fouad Ajami, one of the keenest observers of the Arab world, observed tonight on CNN as the violent assaults were proceeding, this is now a bare-knuckles struggle between the forces of democracy and the forces of autocracy, with fateful consequences for the entire Arab world.

    Larry Diamond: Mubarak Must Go Larry Diamond 2011

  • He created a climate of collegiality that allowed everyone else to flourish, even while demonstrating from one campaign to the next the keenest insights and shrewdest judgments.

    David Broder's remarkable life and career 2011

  • Despite his pre-election promises, Jeremy Hunt has turned out to be the keenest cutter in the cabinet.

    Regional theatre cuts attacked by cast of British stars 2011

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