high-spirited

comparative more high-spirited · superlative most high-spirited

1. Possessing a bold nature.

   "She was as fine a figure of a woman as I was a man, as high-spirited and courageous, as reckless and dare-devilish."

   1918, Jack London, The Princess

   1 more example

   The more high-spirited among the youth were, about the time that our narrative begins, expecting, rather with hope than apprehension, an opportunity of emulating their fathers in their military achievements.

   1816, Sir Walter Scott, chapter 2, in The Black Dwarf

2. Energetic, exuberant, or high-strung.

   Last week a group of four high-spirited folksters known as the Weavers had succeeded in shouting, twanging and crooning folk singing out of its cloistered corner.

   1950 September 25, “Music: Out of the Corner”, in Time

   2 more examples

   Their poor mother was, I believe, naturally a lighthearted, sociable, high-spirited little creature; and her gay and childish nature pined in the isolation and gloom of her lot.

   1861, Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu, chapter 1, in Ultor De Lacy: A Legend of Cappercullen

   Though she was nineteen she gave the effect of a high-spirited precocious child, and in the present glow of her youth and beauty all the men and women she had known were but driftwood on the ripples of her temperament.

   1920 May 27, F[rancis] Scott Fitzgerald, “The Offshore Pirate”, in Flappers and Philosophers, New York, N.Y.: Charles Scribner’s Sons, published September 1920, →OCLC, part III, page 16

   Synonyms: exalted, sassy