Tsuris

Pronunciation

• IPA: /tsÊŠrɪs/, /tsuːrɪs/

Alternative forms

Origin

Borrowed from Yiddish צרות, plural of tsore ‘trouble, problem’, after Hebrew.

Full definition of tsuris

Noun

1. (US, colloquial) Problems or troubles.
• 1968, Ronald Sukenick, Up, page 84, Dial PressYou think you got troubles? You should go down there and talk to some of those schnorrers. Still, what chutzbah. It's like the Jewish moral sense, emerging from all that tsuris.
• 1991, John Updike, Rabbit at Rest“Sounds to me, my friend, like you got some tsuris. Not full grown yet, not gehoketh tsuris, but tsuris.”
• 1997, Hilary Henkin and David Mamet, Wag the Dog, New Line CinemaStanley Moss: I don't need this gig, I don't need the money, I don't need the tsuris ... I don't need it.