shrinking violet

Certainly no one who knows me would accuse me of being a shrinking violet.

Put before proper media scrutiny, the brash “Southern Avenger” is a shrinking violet.

Do you think Chris Christie, no shrinking violet, is going to let Geraldo cruise to the nomination?

No shrinking violet, Gallagher likes the stage and will appear in a production of Love Letters with Sally Struthers this spring.

She makes one of those sandwich men with a bell, on Sixth Avenue, look like a shrinking violet!

"That modest, shrinking violet we hear of so often is a shrieking braggart alongside of our grand young crusader," he remarked.

There was certainly nothing of the shrinking violet about this girl!

Never had he been more eager to play the part of the shrinking violet.

For a summary of his character one would not have used the phrase (as a contemporary of his remarked) of "a shrinking violet."