Word.ws English Dictionary

plays the devil with

plays the devil with is the third-person singular simple present indicative of play the devil with.

Meaning of play the devil with

Verb

play the devil with (third-person singular simple present plays the devil with, present participle playing the devil with, simple past and past participle played the devil with)

  1. (colloquial, idiomatic) To cause great trouble or distress to.
    • There's a silly young fool; but perhaps it's not entirely his fault. The last six months of the war played the devil with many an unformed character.1937, Rupert Penny, The Talkative Policeman, page 166

Questions about plays the devil with

What is plays the devil with the third-person singular simple present indicative of?
Plays the devil with is the third-person singular simple present indicative of play the devil with.

Words near plays the devil with in the dictionary

  1. plays the ball, not the man
  2. plays the board
  3. plays the cat and banjo with
  4. plays the clitar
  5. plays the deuce with
  6. plays the devil with
  7. plays the dickens with
  8. plays the field
  9. plays the fool
  10. plays the game
  11. plays the giddy goat

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: plays the devil with (page history and authors); play the devil with (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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