Word.ws English Dictionary

has the tiger by the tail

has the tiger by the tail is the third-person singular simple present indicative of have the tiger by the tail.

Meaning of have the tiger by the tail

Verb

have the tiger by the tail (third-person singular simple present has the tiger by the tail, present participle having the tiger by the tail, simple past and past participle had the tiger by the tail)

  1. (idiomatic) To be in a difficult or dangerous situation in which one ideally should not remain, but from which one cannot withdraw.
    • "We have the tiger by the tail," Paul whispered. "We can't go down, can't land…and I don't think I can lift us out of this. We'll have to ride it out."1965 October 1, Frank Herbert, “Book II: Muad’Dib”, in Dune, Philadelphia, Pa.: Chilton Book Company; [Toronto], Ont.: Thomas Nelson & Sons, →OCLC, page 225

Questions about has the tiger by the tail

What is has the tiger by the tail the third-person singular simple present indicative of?
Has the tiger by the tail is the third-person singular simple present indicative of have the tiger by the tail.

Words near has the tiger by the tail in the dictionary

  1. has the painters in
  2. has the pas of someone
  3. has the pleasure
  4. has the right time
  5. has the sun in one's eyes
  6. has the tiger by the tail
  7. has the wind up
  8. has the wolf by the ear
  9. has the world by the bag
  10. has the world by the balls
  11. has the world by the neck

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: has the tiger by the tail (page history and authors); have the tiger by the tail (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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