Anxious vs Eager - What's the difference?
anxious | eager |
Full of anxiety or disquietude; greatly concerned or solicitous, especially respecting something future or unknown; being in painful suspense;—applied to persons; as, anxious for the issue of a battle.
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*:Thanks to that penny he had just spent so recklessly [on a newspaper] he would pass a happy hour, taken, for once, out of his anxious , despondent, miserable self. It irritated him shrewdly to know that these moments of respite from carking care would not be shared with his poor wife, with careworn, troubled Ellen.
*{{quote-book, year=1963, author=(Margery Allingham), title=(The China Governess)
, chapter=19 *{{quote-news, year=2012, date=May 13, author=Alistair Magowan, work=BBC Sport
, title= Accompanied with, or causing, anxiety; worrying;—applied to things; as, anxious labor.
*(John Milton) (1608-1674)
*:The sweet of life, from which God hath bid dwell far off all anxious cares.
Earnestly desirous; as, anxious to please.
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* (1800-1859)
*:He sneers alike at those who are anxious to preserve and at those who are eager for reform.
(obsolete) Sharp; sour; acid.
* Shakespeare
(obsolete) Sharp; keen; bitter; severe.
* Shakespeare
* Shakespeare
(rfc-sense) Excited by desire in the pursuit of any object; ardent to pursue, perform, or obtain; keenly desirous; hotly longing; earnest; zealous; impetuous; vehement.
* Keble
* Hawthorne
* {{quote-book, year=1963, author=(Margery Allingham), title=(The China Governess)
, chapter=19 Brittle; inflexible; not ductile.
* John Locke
(comptheory) Not employing lazy evaluation; calculating results immediately, rather than deferring calculation until they are required.
As adjectives the difference between anxious and eager
is that anxious is full of anxiety or disquietude; greatly concerned or solicitous, especially respecting something future or unknown; being in painful suspense;—applied to persons; as, anxious for the issue of a battle while eager is (obsolete) sharp; sour; acid.As a noun eager is
(tidal bore).anxious
English
(Anxiety) (Webster 1913)Alternative forms
* anctious (obsolete)Adjective
(en-adj)citation, passage=Meanwhile Nanny Broome was recovering from her initial panic and seemed anxious to make up for any kudos she might have lost, by exerting her personality to the utmost. She took the policeman's helmet and placed it on a chair, and unfolded his tunic to shake it and fold it up again for him.}}
Sunderland 0-1 Man Utd, passage=But, with United fans in celebratory mood as it appeared their team might snatch glory, they faced an anxious wait as City equalised in stoppage time.}}
Usage notes
* Anxious is followed by for, about, concerning, etc., before the object of solicitude.Synonyms
* careful * concerned * disturbed * restless * solicitous * uneasy * unquiet * watchfulExternal links
* * English refractory feminine rhymeseager
English
(Webster 1913)Etymology 1
From (etyl) eger, from (etyl) egre (French aigre), from (etyl) ; see acid, acerb, etc. Compare vinegar, alegar.Adjective
(er)- like eager droppings into milk
- eager words
- a nipping and an eager air
- When to her eager lips is brought / Her infant's thrilling kiss.
- a crowd of eager and curious schoolboys
citation, passage=When Timothy and Julia hurried up the staircase to the bedroom floor, where a considerable commotion was taking place, Tim took Barry Leach with him. […]. The captive made no resistance and came not only quietly but in a series of eager little rushes like a timid dog on a choke chain.}}
- Gold will be sometimes so eager , as artists call it, that it will as little endure the hammer as glass itself.
- an eager algorithm