CONTRIVER

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does contriver mean? 

• CONTRIVER (noun)
  The noun CONTRIVER has 1 sense:

1. a person who makes plans

  Familiarity information: CONTRIVER used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• CONTRIVER (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A person who makes plans

Classified under:

Nouns denoting people

Synonyms:

contriver; deviser; planner

Hypernyms ("contriver" is a kind of...):

individual; mortal; person; somebody; someone; soul (a human being)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "contriver"):

designer; intriguer (a person who devises plots or intrigues)

maneuverer; manoeuvrer (a person skilled in maneuvering)

plotter; schemer (a planner who draws up a personal scheme of action)

strategian; strategist (an expert in strategy (especially in warfare))

tactician (a person who is skilled at planning tactics)

Derivation:

contrive (make or work out a plan for; devise)

 Context examples 

He was amazed, how so impotent and grovelling an insect as I (these were his expressions) could entertain such inhuman ideas, and in so familiar a manner, as to appear wholly unmoved at all the scenes of blood and desolation which I had painted as the common effects of those destructive machines; whereof, he said, some evil genius, enemy to mankind, must have been the first contriver.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

A heroine returning, at the close of her career, to her native village, in all the triumph of recovered reputation, and all the dignity of a countess, with a long train of noble relations in their several phaetons, and three waiting-maids in a travelling chaise and four, behind her, is an event on which the pen of the contriver may well delight to dwell; it gives credit to every conclusion, and the author must share in the glory she so liberally bestows.

(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)