Word.ws English Dictionary

play it pear-shaped

play it pear-shaped verb: to avoid committing oneself to a single course of action; to go with the flow, take it easy.

Verb

play it pear-shaped (third-person singular simple present plays it pear-shaped, present participle playing it pear-shaped, simple past and past participle played it pear-shaped)

  1. (dated, RAF slang) To avoid committing oneself to a single course of action; to go with the flow, take it easy.
    • I thought I'd play it pear-shaped with the Borough Engineer and asked him whose property it was anyway when it was in my garden — if the Council put it there enough times, it meant they were trying to get rid of it even though they didn't own it.1964, Densil Barr, “I Hate You Lamp-Post, You Know I Love You”, in Joseph F. McCrindle, editor, The Transatlantic Review, number 17, page 112
    • "Playing it pear-shaped" was a favourite expression of Jock's; it seemed to mean deftly turning a situation to one's own advantage; seizing a favorable opportunity: Boxing Clever.[1973, Kyril Bonfiglioli, Mortdecai's Endgame (Mortdecai; 1), Simon & Schuster, →ISBN, page 180

Forms of play it pear-shaped

third-person singular presentplays it pear-shaped
present participleplaying it pear-shaped
past participleplayed it pear-shaped
pastplayed it pear-shaped

Origin of play it pear-shaped

Compare go pear-shaped (“to go awry; to go wrong”), attested somewhat later.

Questions about play it pear-shaped

What does play it pear-shaped mean?
Play it pear-shaped means to avoid committing oneself to a single course of action; to go with the flow, take it easy.
What part of speech is play it pear-shaped?
Play it pear-shaped is a verb.
What is the past tense of play it pear-shaped?
The past tense of play it pear-shaped is played it pear-shaped.

Words near play it pear-shaped in the dictionary

  1. play into the hands of
  2. play it cheap
  3. play it close to the hip
  4. play it cool
  5. play it for all it's worth
  6. play it pear-shaped
  7. play it safe
  8. play it straight
  9. play like
  10. play merry havoc with
  11. play merry hell with

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: play it pear-shaped (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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