Averse Meaning
/əˈvɜː(ɹ)s/Definition, CEFR level C2, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
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Definition
adjHaving a repugnance or opposition of mind.
adjTurned away or backward.
Sentence Examples
He believed the superstition that Christians were averse to learning.
I'm not averse to a good night out.
CEFR Practice Quiz
She is strongly ____ to any form of gambling, so she avoids casinos entirely.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
He is a bit ____ to high risk investments and prefers to save his cash.
Word Origin & History
From Latin aversus, past participle of avertere (“to avert”).
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"“I assure you, cousin,” replied the old gentleman, “that the Baron, notwithstanding his unpleasant manner, […] is not, after all, so bad as you make him out to be; and further, I should like to know why you are so averse to him.”"
— 1885, E. T. A. Hoffmann, The Entail, archived from the original on 13 Apr 2011:
"This is why the most eminent intellects have always been strongly averse to any kind of disturbance, interruption and distraction, and above everything to that violent interruption which is caused by noise; other people do not take any particular notice of this sort of thing."
— 2004, Arthur Schopenhauer, chapter 2, in Essays of Schopenhauer:
"The tracks averse a lying notice gave, / And led the searcher backward from the cave."
— 1697, Virgil, “(please specify the book number)”, in John Dryden, transl., The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC:
"[…] and, in this panegyrick of the Teutonick blood, I have so prolixly insisted, not only to vindicate our own, as being a stream of the same, and to evince the nobility thereof, but withal to convince the folly of those wretches among us, who aversing ours do so much adhere unto, and dote upon descents from France and Normandy."
— 1808, The Harleian miscellany:
"The inconveniences aversing from clandestine marriages are pointedly depicted in the last two lines, teaching lessons of morality to all romantic babies."
— 1859, The Yale Literary Magazine, volume 24, number 7, page 302:
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CEFR Practice Quiz
She is strongly ____ to any form of gambling, so she avoids casinos entirely.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
He is a bit ____ to high risk investments and prefers to save his cash.