prima donna
a first or principal female singer of an opera company.
a temperamental person; a person who takes adulation and privileged treatment as a right and reacts with petulance to criticism or inconvenience.
Origin of prima donna
1Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024
How to use prima donna in a sentence
Allen Barra blasts him for being a mediocre prima donna who will be beaten by the Jets.
How do you think that shyness played out during the 2008 season when he was accused of being a prima donna?
The tenor dies; the prima donna appears to do the same, but the libretto consoles you by declaring that she only swoons.
Physiology of The Opera | John H. Swaby (AKA "Scrici")He sang bravura airs with a facility of vocalisation any prima donna might have envied.
The Life & Letters of Peter Ilich Tchaikovsky | Modeste TchaikovskyEven here the glorious voice of the prima donna floated clear as a silver bell.
The Weight of the Crown | Fred M. White
The young girl became, thanks to him, the celebrated prima donna of the Fenice theatre, at Venice in 1820.
Repertory Of The Comedie Humaine, Complete, A -- Z | Anatole Cerfberr and Jules Franois ChristopheIt was a dismissal, immediate, discourteous, on the grounds that she was quite unequal to fill the position of prima donna.
Black Diamonds | Mr Jkai
British Dictionary definitions for prima donna
/ (ˈpriːmə ˈdɒnə) /
a female operatic star; diva
informal a temperamental person
Origin of prima donna
1Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Cultural definitions for prima donna
[ (pree-muh, prim-uh don-uh) ]
A vain and overly sensitive person who is temperamental and difficult to work with: “That Jenkins girl is a good gymnast, but she certainly is a prima donna.” In opera, the prima donna is the principal female soloist. From Italian, meaning “first lady.”
The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
Browse