bend someone's will

present singular third person bends someone's will · participle present bending someone's will · participle past bent someone's will · past bent someone's will

1. idiomatictransitiveTo persuade or otherwise induce someone to change his or her views or to choose a different course of action.

   [E]ven her love could not avail to bend his will. As if the hold of her arms was that of a child's he loosened it and stepped away.

   1912, Zane Grey, chapter 20, in Riders of the Purple Sage

   2 more examples

   [W]hen Catherine tried to draw him to court by proposing a marriage between him and her youngest daughter Margaret, Jeanne left him at home, and went herself to court. Catherine tried in vain to bend her will.

   1882, Charlotte M. Yonge, History of France, ch. 5: The Wars of Religion

   Despite Shearer's insistence that he intends to hang up his scoring boots at the end of the season, Souness has pledged to keep pestering him to change his mind. Whether the Iron Laddie is for turning remains to be seen, but the pressure to bend his will is being applied from within the Newcastle dressing-room as well as from the manager's office.

   2005 January 23, Simon Turnbull, "Carry on Shearer: Given's plea to captain, Independent (UK)(retrieved 23 Aug 2019)