priggish

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

Frank Burns, the priggish Army doctor who was obsessed with nurse “Hot Lips” Houlihan in “MASH,” Duvall specialized in tightly wound tough guys.

From Los Angeles Times • Feb. 16, 2026

He’s so insufferably priggish that at school his name, William Orser, has by common consent been elided to the nonexistent word “Worser,” just to drive him crazy.

From New York Times • Aug. 12, 2022

In chapter 36, Lucy arrives at the home of a priggish parson, whose wife is desperately ill with typhoid.

From Washington Post • May 26, 2020

The corporate culture that it reflects and embodies is, above all, sanctimoniousness, nostalgic, and priggish.

From The New Yorker • Nov. 19, 2019

Mantell was a lanky assemblage of shortcomings–he was vain, self-absorbed, priggish, neglectful of his family–but never was there a more devoted amateur paleontologist.

From "A Short History of Nearly Everything" by Bill Bryson