Cheshire cat

American  

noun

1. a constantly grinning cat in Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.

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idioms

1. grin like a Cheshire cat, to smile or grin inscrutably.

Cheshire cat Cultural  

1. A cat with an enormous grin encountered by Alice in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, by Lewis Carroll. The cat tends to disappear, leaving only its smile hanging in the air.

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“Smiling like a Cheshire cat” refers to anyone with a conspicuous and long-lasting smile.

Example Sentences

Like the steward, he is grinning like a Cheshire cat today.

From BBC • Aug. 28, 2025

That attitude makes him equally fabulous and terrifying, very much like the Cheshire cat.

From Salon • Dec. 31, 2022

Since both Manchester City players live in Cheshire, when England entered the tournament quarterfinals unbeaten, the skinny gray-and-black-striped kitten seemed destined to become a Cheshire cat.

From Los Angeles Times • Dec. 11, 2022

He singled out the Cheshire cat, whose strategy was endurance and persistence, not direction.

From Washington Post • Sep. 9, 2020

About one hundred yards up that hill ran the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway tracks, where black and navy-blue trains with a yellow Cheshire cat painted on them rumbled through town twice daily, morning and evening.

From "Reaching for the Moon" by Katherine Johnson