look daggers at, to

if looks could kill

An expression used when someone makes an angry or unpleasant face at someone, indicating that such an expression represents hostility. And the way she looked at me when I mentioned her father in my speech? Yeesh, if looks could kill.See also: could, if, kill, look

if looks could kill

a catchphrase said when someone makes a frown at someone or when someone casts a dirty look. Did you see the way she looked at me? If looks could kill... If looks could kill... What a nasty glare she gave me.See also: could, if, kill, look

look daggers at someone

Fig. to give someone a dirty look. Tom must have been mad at Ann from the way he was looking daggers at her. Don't you dare look daggers at me! Don't even look cross-eyed at me!See also: dagger, look

look daggers at

glare angrily or venomously at. The expression speak daggers is also found and is used by Shakespeare's Hamlet in the scene in which he reproaches his mother.See also: dagger, look

look daggers at

To glare at angrily or hatefully.See also: dagger, look

look daggers at, to

To glare at someone. The term first appeared in the Greek playwright Aristophanes’s The Birds (ca. 414 b.c.) and was alluded to several times by Shakespeare. “There’s daggers in men’s smiles,” he wrote (Macbeth, 2:3). The image aptly conveys the fierceness of such a glance and appealed to numerous other writers, including Thoreau. A synonymous cliché is if looks could kill, which has been around since the early 1900s. Frank Harris used it in My Life and Loves (1922): “When they let me up I looked at Jones, and if looks could kill, he would have had short shrift.”See also: dagger, look