Dictionary › 棘手

棘手

jí shǒu

HSK 3.0 level 7-9 2-character word

棘手 (jí shǒu) means "thorny (problem); intractable". It is an HSK 3.0 level 7-9 word, and was not on the old six-level HSK list.

What 棘手 means

1. thorny (problem)
2. intractable

The characters in 棘手

• 棘jíthorns
• 手shǒuhand; (formal) to hold; person engaged in certain types of work

Example sentences

• 情况很棘手。
  The situation is difficult.
• 对于这个棘手的问题，无论我尝试多少次，结果都会以失败告终。
  Duìyú zhège jíshǒu de wèntí, wúlùn wǒ chángshì duōshao cì, jiéguǒ dōu huì yǐ shībài gàozhōng.
  Regardless how many times I try to solve this nasty problem, I always end up failing.

Sounds the same

Read jí shǒu, tone for tone, but written differently.

• 疾首extremely angry; infuriated; enraged
• 吉首see 吉首市

Go deeper

• The four tones and the neutral tone, to read jí shǒu correctly.
• Look up another word in the free dictionary.