Pronunciations (2)
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/pliːz/
Pronunciation notes
- Received-Pronunciation
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/pliz/
Pronunciation notes
- General-American
Verb
To make happy or satisfy; to give pleasure to.
Usage- Transitive or intransitive
- Examples
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Her presentation pleased the executives.
I'm pleased to see you've been behaving yourself.
More examples (4)
Our new range of organic foods is sure to please.
And so it had always pleased M. Stutz to expect great things from the dark young man whom he had first seen in his early twenties ; and his expectations had waxed rather than waned on hearing the faint bruit of the love of Ivor and Virginia—for Virginia, M. Stutz thought, would bring fineness to a point in a man like Ivor Marlay, […].
World tour, media whore / "Please the Press in Belgium!" / This was your life
How can an operator be, at the same time, top for overall satisfaction and bottom for value for money? I turned to Anthony Smith for the answer, leaning on his 20 years running Transport Focus and its predecessors. It's commuters, he explained. "You can't please commuters, you can only not displease them."
To desire; to will; to be pleased by.
Usage- ergative
- Intransitive
- Examples
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Just do as you please.
He doesn't think, he just says whatever he pleases.
More examples (3)
Whatsoeuer the Lord pleased, that did he in heauen and in earth: in the Seas, and all deepe places.
“Will any gentleman please to get outside and make room for a lady?”
"I don't say it and I don't think it," responded Sancho. "It's their affair and let them eat it with their bread; whether or not they were lovers, they've already made their accounting with God; I tend to my vines, it's their business, not mine; I don't stick my nose in; if you buy and lie, your purse wants to know why. Besides, naked I was born, and naked I'll die: I don't lose or gain a thing; whatever they were, it's all the same to me. And many folks think there's bacon when there's not even a hook to hang it on. But who can put doors on a field? Let them say what they please, I don't care.
Adverb
Used to make a polite request.
Usage- not-comparable
- Examples
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Please, pass the bread.
Would you please sign this form?
More examples (5)
Could you tell me the time, please?
May I take your order, please?
Q: Should I call him to confirm? A: Please do.
LIST OF LETTERS remaining in the Post-Office at New Orleans, September 19, 1857. Persons calling will please mention that they are advertised.
(Michael): Yuri Andropov! What are you doing in my closet of anxieties again? (Yuri): Uh, oh. This is not 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., Washington, D.C.? (Michael): Does it look like it? You're in the wrong nightmare again!! (Yuri): ★@#*!?! Soviet maps ... worth nothing! Give, please, directions to White House.
Interjection
Used as an affirmative to an offer.
Usage- often
- with yes
- Synonyms
- Examples
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Near-synonym: thank you
May I help you? —(Yes,) please.
More examples (1)
D'you mind if I open the window? —Please do.
An expression of annoyance, impatience, or exasperation.
- Examples
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Oh, please, do we have to hear that again?
So it's safe to let a 10-year-old use a gun? Please.
More examples (1)
So now I have to go back there a third time? Please!
An expression of annoyance, impatience, or exasperation.
Usage- followed by with + noun or noun phrase
- Examples
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Near-synonyms: enough, enough already, that's enough, no more, cut it out, knock it off, shut up, STFU
Please with that damn harmonica!
More examples (1)
Please with all the ads, I just want to watch the movie.
Interjection
Said as a request to repeat information.
Usage- Cincinnati
- Examples
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Customer while ordering: Can I get a [unintelligible]? Restaurant employee: Please?
Fellow: May I have a few days off to get married? Reply, in the Cincinnati idiom by a boss who had heard the sound but not the sense: Boss: Please?
More examples (6)
Even though I heard it was supposed to be German-Catholic background, there’s only one thing German — they say ‘please’ [for the more common ‘pardon me’], which comes from bitte.
[…] He explained in broken English that one of his daughters was ill and he probably could not be there. I did not understand all that he said, so asked, ‘Please?’ per Cincinnati custom. ‘There is no need to plead. I will be there if she is feeling better,’ he replied.
Cincinnati are some of the most polite persons I have ever met in the US. When asking someone a question, instead of saying “Excuse me,” or “Pardon,” they say “Please?”
By the same token, one contestant who doesn’t hear a particular question could say “Pardon me?” while another could say “Please?” Again, neither would be lying if he said he was from Ohio.
In Maine, where as much as a quarter of the population has French ancestry, you may hear a stray hair called a couette, and in parts of Ohio please is used in the same way as the German bitte, to invite a person to repeat something just said — apparently a remnant of the bilingual schooling once available in Cincinnati.
Ellen grew up outside of Cincinnati and believed her own talk was the “norm,” while others were speakers of dialects. She was in graduate school before she learned that not all people say, Please? to mean Can you repeat that?
Adverb
used in polite request
- Examples
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please pay attention
Verb
give pleasure to or be pleasing to
- Synonyms
- Antonyms
- Examples
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These colors please the senses
a pleasing sensation
be the will of or have the will (to)
- Examples
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he could do many things if he pleased
give satisfaction
- Examples
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The waiters around her aim to please