The Oxford Thesaurus An A-Z Dictionary of Synonyms - short adj.

1) small, little, slight, petite, diminutive, wee, tiny, elfin, minuscule; midget, dwarfish, squat, dumpy, runty, stubby, stunted, Colloq pint-sized, knee-high to a grasshopper, sawn-off: Did you know that Queen Victoria was quite short? 2 shortened, brief, concise, compressed, compendious, compact, pocket, US vest-pocket; abbreviated, abridged, cut: A short version of the book was published in paperback. 3) laconic, terse, succinct, pithy, sententious, epigrammatic: He made a few short remarks that were very much to the point. 4) abrupt, curt, terse, sharp, blunt, bluff, brusque, sharp, offhand, gruff, testy, snappish, discourteous, uncivil, impolite: It is unnecessary to be so short with the staff. 5) direct, straight, straightforward, short and sweet: In reply to your request for permission to leave early, the short answer is 'No'. 6) Usually, short of. deficient (in) , lacking (in) , needful (of) , wanting, inadequate, shy (of) , low (on) : The hotel is short of clean linen because the laundry failed to deliver. 7) brief, limited; transitory, temporary, short-lived, momentary, quick, transient: HQ had a short life but a happy one. I'll just make a short stop in here and will join you in a moment. 8) impecunious, straitened, pinched, underfunded, poor, penniless, deficient: I'm a bit short today and wonder if you could lend me some money? 9 in short supply. rare, scarce, scanty, unplentiful, meagre, sparse, Colloq chiefly Brit thin on the ground: Good editors are in short supply these days. 1) 0 short of. before, failing, excluding, exclusive of, barring, eliminating, precluding, excepting, except for, leaving out, apart from, setting aside: Short of killing him, I am not sure what she could have done in the circumstances. --adv. 1) 1 abruptly, suddenly, peremptorily, without warning, instantly, unexpectedly, hurriedly, hastily, out of the blue: She stopped short in the middle of the road and made me get out. 12 cut short. a trim, curtail, shorten, abbreviate, cut: I must cut my visit short because I have a train to catch. b stop, cut off, terminate, cut in on, break in on, interrupt; butt in: I am sorry to cut you short, but it is getting on for midnight. 1) 3 fall or come short. fail, be or prove inadequate or insufficient: These grades fall short of our expectations, Bobby. --n. 1) 4 in short. briefly, in a word, all in all, to make a long story short, in a nutshell: He told me, in short, that there was no job and there never had been one. 15 shorts. Bermuda shorts, knee-breeches, knee-pants, hot pants: I usually wear shorts to play tennis.