pleasure
Pluralpleasures (some meanings)
Pluralpleasures (some meanings)
Formspleasures, pleasuring, pleasured
- 1The state of being pleased or contented; a feeling of enjoyment or gratification.
She sighed with pleasure as she sank into the warm bath.
He takes great pleasure in cooking elaborate dinners for his friends.
UsageYou take pleasure in something or do it with pleasure. Said alone, With pleasure! is a glad yes to a request.
Similarhappiness, satisfaction, delight, gratification, gladness
Oppositepain, displeasure
- 2A person, thing, or action that causes enjoyment for someone.
Talking with you this evening has been a real pleasure.
A hot shower after a long hike is one of life's small pleasures.
UsageOften a pleasure to + verb: it was a pleasure to work with you. Plural for small joys: life's simple pleasures.
Similarjoy, delight, indulgence
Oppositechore
Note
The King James Bible of 1611 keeps an older idiom, to do someone a pleasure, as when Festus is "willing to do the Jews a pleasure", which means to do them a kindness. The courteous It was a pleasure to meet you also belongs here; cut down to one word, it becomes the greeting "Pleasure".
- 3Used as a polite reply to thanks, or as a greeting, short for 'It's my pleasure' or 'It's a pleasure to meet you.'
'Thank you for staying late to finish the report.' 'My pleasure. Happy to help.'
'Pleasure,' he said warmly, shaking hands around the table.
UsageMy pleasure answers thanks, a warmer you're welcome; pleasure to meet you, or just Pleasure, is said when meeting someone.
- 4Enjoyment or gratification that is sexual in nature.
Their lovemaking was unhurried, each partner attentive to the other's pleasure.
Ancient erotic manuals treated pleasure as an art to be studied and refined.
- 5What a person wants or would prefer, and also the will of someone in power.
'What's your pleasure tonight, the steak or the salmon?' the waiter asked.
Stay another night or leave at dawn, whatever your pleasure.
UsageMostly in What's your pleasure?, offering a choice, and at someone's pleasure, meaning as they decide.
Note
Often heard now in the courteous offer of a choice: "What is your pleasure: coffee or tea?" The question hands the decision to the other person, which is why it keeps company with fancy, wish and want. Its other synonym, will, marks the formal use, as in serve at the pleasure of the President, where pleasure decides for others rather than choosing for oneself.
Less common meanings
- 6To take pleasure in something; to seek or pursue enjoyment.
Note
Time has turned this verb into a period piece. It survives best in to go pleasuring, which is built like go fishing or go shopping and describes an outing in search of enjoyment. Unlike the transitive verb, it takes no object, because the pleasure is the subject's own. In modern prose it sounds deliberately old-fashioned, so it suits historical or playful writing.
Checked 6 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
- To go pleasuring is an attested construction using go followed by an -ing form, parallel to go fishing and go shopping. en.wiktionary.org
- In this sense, pleasure is intransitive and means taking or pursuing enjoyment oneself. en.wiktionary.org
- 7To give sexual pleasure to someone.
She guided his hands, showing him how to pleasure her.
He took his time pleasuring his partner, in no rush at all.
- 8To give or afford enjoyment or satisfaction to someone.
Few things pleasure him more than a quiet morning with the newspaper.
The unexpected praise pleasured her more than she cared to admit.
UsagePleasure someone is easily read as sexual today; please or delight says this without the double meaning.
Similarplease, gratify, satisfy
Oppositedisplease, annoy, irritate
Note
The transitive verb has literary credentials. Tennyson in 1864 has a boy who rolled his hoop "to pleasure Edith", with nothing sexual in it. Because the sexual verb has the same form and the same construction, the innocent reading can easily be lost.
Showing meanings only.
Practice
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Origin
It comes from Middle English plaisir 'pleasure', whose ending was later reshaped to match words in -ure (pleasur, plesur), from Old French plesir/plaisir 'to please' (an infinitive used as a noun), from Latin placeō 'to please, to seem good', whose deeper origin is uncertain.
Checked 6 Nov 2026 · 3 facts
- The altered form already existed in late Middle English, in the fifteenth century. upload.wikimedia.org
- Middle English plaisir came from Old French plesir/plaisir, an infinitive meaning 'to please' used as a noun. en.wiktionary.org
- The French word derives from Latin placeō, meaning 'to please, to seem good'. en.wiktionary.org