Slick Meaning
/slɪk/Definition, CEFR level C1, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
Listen pronunciation
Definition
adjSlippery or smooth due to a covering of liquid; often used to describe appearances.
adjSleek; smooth.
Sentence Examples
Don't swallow that slick propaganda.
Watch your step! It's slick out!
The statues in the museum courtyard were slick with rain.
Synonyms & Antonyms
Antonyms:
CEFR Practice Quiz
After the rain, the road became extremely ____ and dangerous to drive on.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The wet pavement was very ____, so the pedestrians had to walk very carefully to avoid falling.
Word Origin & History
From Middle English slicke, slike, slyke, from Old English slīc (“sleek, smooth; crafty, cunning, slick”), from Proto-Germanic *slīkaz (“sleek, smooth”), from Proto-Indo-European *sleyg-, *sleyǵ- (“to glide, smooth, spread”). Akin to Dutch sluik, dialectal Dutch sleek (“even, smooth”), Old Norse slíkr (“sleek, smooth”), Old English slician (“to make sleek, smooth, or glossy”).
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"my nipples got hard, and my cunt was slickwith juice."
— 2006, Rachel Kramer Bussel, Glamour Girls: Femme/femme Erotica, Haworth Press, →ISBN:
"Morning commuters in parts of Texas, Oklahoma and Arkansas discovered slick sidewalks and icy roadways Monday."
— 2024 January 21, Elizabeth Wolfe, Robert Shackelford and Mary Gilbert, “Icy conditions make for hazardous travel across central US, but warmer air is on the horizon”, in CNN:
"Both slick and dainty."
— [1611?], Homer, “(please specify |book=I to XXIV)”, in Geo[rge] Chapman, transl., The Iliads of Homer Prince of Poets. […], London: […] Nathaniell Butter, →OCLC; republished as The Iliads of Homer, Prince of Poets, […], new edition, volume (please specify the book number), London: Charles Knight and Co., […], 1843, →OCLC:
"The threat the most radical of them pose is evidently far greater at home than abroad: in one characteristically slick and chilling Isis video – entitled “a message to the Jordanian tyrant” – a smiling, long-haired young man in black pats the explosive belt round his waist as he burns his passport and his fellow fighters praise the memory of Zarqawi, who was killed in Iraq in 2006."
— 2014 November 27, Ian Black, “Courts kept busy as Jordan works to crush support for Isis”, in The Guardian:
"I leave the train at Salisbury, where (in a very slick operation) another two-car set is added to the front of the train before it heads for London."
— 2022 November 16, Paul Bigland, “From rural branches to high-speed arteries”, in RAIL, number 970, page 55:
Explore More C1 Vocabulary Words
CEFR Practice Quiz
After the rain, the road became extremely ____ and dangerous to drive on.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The wet pavement was very ____, so the pedestrians had to walk very carefully to avoid falling.