BY FITS AND STARTS • DICCIONARIO INGLES.COM • Definition of By fits and starts

Add this Dictionary
to your website!
See more options...

/baɪ fɪts ənd stɑrts/ Listen

noun

Fit n.

1.

A stroke or blow. (Obs. or R.) "Curse on that cross, quoth then the Sarazin, That keeps thy body from the bitter fit."

2.

A sudden and violent attack of a disorder; a stroke of disease, as of epilepsy or apoplexy, which produces convulsions or unconsciousness; a convulsion; a paroxysm; hence, a period of exacerbation of a disease; in general, an attack of disease; as, a fit of sickness. "And when the fit was on him, I did mark How he did shake."

3.

A mood of any kind which masters or possesses one for a time; a temporary, absorbing affection; a paroxysm; as, a fit of melancholy, of passion, or of laughter. "All fits of pleasure we balanced by an equal degree of pain." "The English, however, were on this subject prone to fits of jealously."

4.

A passing humor; a caprice; a sudden and unusual effort, activity, or motion, followed by relaxation or inaction; an impulsive and irregular action. "The fits of the season."

5.

A darting point; a sudden emission. (R.) "A tongue of light, a fit of flame."

By fits, By fits and starts, by intervals of action and repose; impulsively and irregularly; intermittently.

See images of 'By fits and starts'

Etymology of 'By fits and starts'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

Share |

"By fits and starts" Quotes from Famous Books

... in motion; now slow; now by fits and starts; washing her face to-day, her hands to-morrow. Never going straight, even along the road; talking with the waggoner, helping a child to pick watercress, patting the shepherd's dog, finding a flower, and late every morning at the hay-field. It was so far to come, she said; ...

— The Life of the Fields • Richard Jefferies

... Thomas went on looking at Adelia by fits and starts, although he did not again catch Adelia looking at him. He noticed that she had round rosy cheeks and twinkling brown eyes. She did not look like an old maid, and Young Thomas wondered that she had been allowed to become one. ...

— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1909 to 1922 • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... addressed me by fits and starts and longo intervallo, yet displaying so manifest and absorbent a delight in my society that he could not bring himself to terminate the audience, while I was to conceal my immense wearisomeness and the ardent desire I ...

— Baboo Jabberjee, B.A. • F. Anstey

... is best enjoyed when it is sought for with some trouble and difficulty, and partly because such beauty, and the romance which is attached to it, should not make up the staple of one's life. Romance, if it is to come at all, should always come by fits and starts." ...

— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope

... blinked like an owl in sunlight and had a wearisome cough. There was always a sickly smell of lozenges about him, and he was fretful if every window was not tightly closed. On Percival's right was a sallow youth of nineteen. He worked by fits and starts, sometimes driving his pen along as if the well-being of the universe depended on the swift completion of his task and the planets might cease to revolve if he were idle, while a few minutes later he would be drawing absently on his blotting-paper or ...

— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. July, 1878. • Various

Copyright © 2025 Diccionario ingles.com