look

present singular third person looks · participle present looking · participle past looked · past looked · first person past singular looked · archaic present second person singular lookest · past second person singular looked · archaic past second person singular lookedst · present singular third person looks · archaic present singular third person looketh · past singular third person looked · past plural looked · past subjunctive looked · participle present looking · participle past looked

1. To try to see, to pay attention to with one’s eyes.
   1. intransitiveAs an intransitive verb, often with "at".

      They kept looking at me.

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      Don’t look in the closet.

      Then came a maid with hand-bag and shawls, and after her a tall young lady.[…]She looked around expectantly, and recognizing Mrs. Cooke's maid[…]Miss Thorn greeted her with a smile which greatly prepossessed us in her favor.

      1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter V, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC

      He looked round the poor room, at the distempered walls, and the bad engravings in meretricious frames, the crinkly paper and wax flowers on the chiffonier; and he thought of a room like Father Bryan's, with panelling, with cut glass, with tulips in silver pots, such a room as he had hoped to have for his own.

      1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter X, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC

      Timothy Leary's dead. No, no no no, he's outside, looking in.

      1968, Ray Thomas, “Legend of a Mind”, in In Search of the Lost Chord, performed by The Moody Blues

   2. colloquialtransitiveAs a transitive verb, often in the imperative; chiefly takes relative clause as direct object.

      Look who's back!

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      Look what you did to him!

      Look how they massacred my boy.

      1972, The Godfather

2. To appear, to seem.

   Our new boss looks to be friendly.

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   It looks as if it’s going to rain soon. or It looks like it’s going to rain soon. or It looks like rain [is coming].

   It looks as if [or like] I'm stuck with you.

   (UK) He always looks like scoring a goal if not two.

   THERE is a pleaſure in owning obligations which it is a pleaſure to have received; but ſhould I publiſh any favours done me by your Lordſhip, I am afraid it would look more like vanity, than gratitude.

   c. 1701-03, Joseph Addison, Remarks on Several Parts of Italy, &c., Dedication

   So this was my future home, I thought![…]Backed by towering hills, the but faintly discernible purple line of the French boundary off to the southwest, a sky of palest Gobelin flecked with fat, fleecy little clouds, it in truth looked a dear little city; the city of one's dreams.

   1908, W[illiam] B[lair] M[orton] Ferguson, chapter IV, in Zollenstein, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC

3. copulativeTo give an appearance of being.

   That painting looks nice.

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   What a fright you looked in that hideous outfit.

   You’re looking worried. Whaddya thinking about?

   You looked a fool when you slipped on a banana peel.

   You didn't use to look so dismal, but now you look/are looking positively unhappy.

   Once, slipping the money clandestinely, just in the act of taking leave, he slipt it not into her hand but on the floor, and another had it; whereupon the poor Monk, coming to know it, looked mere despair for some days[…].

   1843, Thomas Carlyle, Past and Present, book 2, chapter 6, Monk Samson

4. intransitiveoftenTo search for, to try to find.
5. To face or present a view.

   The hotel looks over the valleys of the Hindu Kush.

   2 more examples

   1769, Benjamin Blayney (editor), King James Bible, Oxford standard text, Ezekiel, xi, 1, Moreover the spirit lifted me up, and brought me unto the east gate of the LORD's house, which looketh eastward:

   Wornath-Mavai lieth in a valley and looketh towards the south, and on the slopes of it Sish rested among the flowers when Sish was young.

   1905, Lord Dunsany [i.e., Edward Plunkett, 18th Baron of Dunsany], The Gods of Pegāna, London: [Charles] Elkin Mathews, […], →OCLC

6. To expect or anticipate.

   I look to each hour for my lover’s arrival.

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   1596, Edmund Spenser, The Fairie Queene, Book VI, Canto XI, 1750, The Works of Edmund Spenser, Volume 4, page 139,

   "Ain't gone be no Rikers Island for you next time," I warned him. "You get tapped on another gun charge and you looking at some upstate time." Looking each Hour into Death's Mouth to fall,

   2006, Noire [pseudonym], Thug-A-Licious: An Urban Erotic Tale, New York, N.Y.: One World, Ballantine Books, →ISBN, page 108

   Gloster, what ere we like, thou art Protector, And lookest to command the Prince and Realme.

   1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Sixt”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene i]

7. transitiveTo express or manifest by a look.

   Soft eyes looked love to eyes which spake again,

   c. 1815, Lord Byron, Waterloo

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   For a few seconds Mr Carlyle looked his unutterable feelings. When he did speak it was with crushing deliberation.

   1923, Ernest Bramah [pseudonym; Ernest Brammah Smith], “(please specify the page)”, in The Eyes of Max Carrados, London: Grant Richards, →OCLC

8. oftentransitiveTo make sure of, to see to.

   "Look to it yourself, father," answered Telemachus, "for they say you are the wisest counsellor in the world, and that there is no other mortal man who can compare with you.[…]

   1898, Homer, translated by Samuel Butler, The Odyssey

9. datedfigurativelysometimesTo show oneself in looking; to peep out.

   I have[…]more feet than shoes, or such shoes as my toes look through the overleather.

   c. 1590–1592 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Taming of the Shrew”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act INDUCTION, scene ii]

10. archaicdialectaltransitiveTo check, to make sure (of something).

    Finding it was like to overblow, we took in our Sprit-ſail, and ſtood by to hand the Fore-ſail; but making foul Weather, we look'd the Guns were all faſt, and handed the Miſſen.

    1726 October 28, [Jonathan Swift], “A Great Storm Described, the Long-Boat Sent to Fetch Water, the Author Goes with It to Discover the Country. […]”, in Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World. […] [Gulliver’s Travels], volume I, London: […] Benj[amin] Motte, […], →OCLC, part II (A Voyage to Brobdingnag), page 151

11. obsoletetransitiveTo look at; to turn the eyes toward.

    Serene, smiling, enigmatic, she faced him with no fear whatever showing in her dark eyes.[…]She put back a truant curl from her forehead where it had sought egress to the world, and looked him full in the face now,[…].

    1910, Emerson Hough, chapter I, in The Purchase Price: Or The Cause of Compromise, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC

12. obsoletetransitiveTo seek; to search for.

    c. 1552–1599, Edmund Spenser, unidentified sonnet, Looking my love, I go from place to place, Like a young fawn that late hath lost the hind; And seek each where, where last I saw her face, Whose image yet I carry fresh in mind.

13. obsoletetransitiveTo influence, overawe, or subdue by looks or presence.

    to look down opposition

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    1692, John Dryden, Cleomenes the Spartan Hero, a Tragedy, Act 3, Scene 1, 1701, The Comedies, Tragedies, and Operas Written by John Dryden, Esq, Volume 2, page 464, A Spirit fit to start into an Empire, And look the World to Law.

    Ovid might have evaded her entreaties by means of an excuse. But her eyes were irresistible: they looked him into submission in an instant.

    1882, Wilkie Collins, Heart and Science

14. ball gamesTo look at a pitch as a batter without swinging at it.

    The fastball caught him looking.

    2 more examples

    Clem Labine struck Mays out looking at his last at bat.

    It's unusual for Mays to strike out looking. He usually takes a cut at it.

1. Pay attention.

   Look, I'm going to explain what to do, so you have to listen closely.

   1 more example

   ‘Look,’ he began, and she flapped a hand to stop him. ‘For God’s sake don’t say anything that starts with “look”. Sentences like that lead anywhere and they’re always fatal.’

   2001, Cynthia Harrod-Eagles, “Not Buried But In Turd”, in Gone Tomorrow, London: Little, Brown and Company, →ISBN, page 203

   Synonyms: hey, listen, listen up, look at me, see, so, well

plural looks

1. The action of looking; an attempt to see.

   Let’s have a look under the hood of the car.

   Synonyms: gander

2. oftenpluralPhysical appearance, visual impression.

   She got her mother’s looks.

   2 more examples

   I don’t like the look of the new design.

   He tried to persuade Cicely to stay away from the ball-room for a fourth dance. […] But she said she must go back, and when they joined the crowd again her partner was haled off with a frightened look to the royal circle, […]

   1909 September 9, Archibald Marshall [pseudonym; Arthur Hammond Marshall], chapter I, in The Squire’s Daughter, London: Methuen & Co. […], →OCLC

3. A facial expression.

   If looks could kill ...

   1 more example

   He gave me a dirty look.

1. A surname transferred from the given name.

1. A surname from Chinese.