adjective

• Noisy and difficult to control.

  ‘the boy is cocky and obstreperous’

  More example sentences

  • ‘It is all the more unhappy because we see what gentleness, what tact and professionalism he has to bring to the job of minicab driving: dealing with all sorts of obstreperous and difficult customers.’
  • ‘The crowd seated in the bleachers - it was a full house - was incessantly loud and obstreperous.’
  • ‘If NASA can pull it off - and at the same time deal once and for with obstreperous French air traffic controllers and striking baggage handlers - the result could be a civil aviation revolution.’
  • ‘Most of the young people he'd come into contact with thought any music which wasn't loud and obstreperous was a waste of ears.’
  • ‘Already he could hear the growing clamor of his three obstreperous children.’
  • ‘And they'll indicate whether a patient was noisy and needed medication or if they were obstreperous and perhaps needed to be placed in a straight jacket or tied to the bed.’
  • ‘Also at the home is an obstreperous new resident named Patrick, an ex-alcoholic who develops a close relationship with Clara, believing her to be a lost love from the Second World War.’
  • ‘Your confirmation may therefore be vetoed by an obstreperous minority that needs no other reason besides, of course, the fact that you are ‘extreme.’’
  • ‘‘He didn't exactly embrace the editing process,’ my editor said, hinting, albeit understatedly, at the reporter's obstreperous personality.’
  • ‘Some of them can be very demanding and ungrateful, even obstreperous and fractious.’
  • ‘Particularly obstreperous prisoners were hosed down with cold water from the bay, a practice that earned the warden the nickname ‘Saltwater’ Johnston.’
  • ‘The obstreperous emails in question focus on Norway's economic relationship with the European Union.’
  • ‘At 178 pounds was the one and only Cassius Clay, who was cantankerous, garrulous and obstreperous.’
  • ‘The guard was armed with a long spear and a knife, the goat with only his tiny sharp teeth and his severely obstreperous attitude.’
  • ‘He sticks to his mission, getting the obstreperous children into school and helping them become learners.’
  • ‘Most male penguins are known for being obstreperous, territorial squawkers.’
  • ‘They are now more likely to call a product obstreperous than blame themselves for their ineptitude.’
  • ‘In my experience, Lefschetz was both obstreperous and enthusiastic - about research in mathematics.’
  • ‘His clothes are shabby, his shoes worn, but he is always ready to intervene if some of the young men become a bit obstreperous.’
  • ‘Anyway, I'm feeling obstreperous, so what exactly should the US do in the conduct of future war?’

  Synonyms

  disorderly, rowdy, wild, unmanageable, uncontrollable, disobedient, disruptive, attention-seeking, undisciplined, troublemaking, rebellious, mutinous, anarchic, chaotic, lawless, insubordinate, defiant, wayward, wilful, headstrong, irrepressible, unrestrained, obstreperous, difficult, intractable, out of hand, refractory, recalcitrant

  View synonyms