wade through


Also found in: Idioms.

wade

 (wād)
v. wad·ed, wad·ing, wades
v.intr.
To walk in or through water or something else that similarly impedes normal movement.
v.tr.
To cross or pass through (water, for example) with difficulty: wade a swift creek.
n.
The act or an instance of wading.
Phrasal Verbs:
wade in (or into)
To begin resolutely or energetically to do (something): waded into the task.
wade through
To read (something) with great effort: waded through the school's correspondence.
[Middle English waden, from Old English wadan.]
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
Translations

w>wade through

vi +prep obj
(lit) → waten durch
(fig) → sich (durch)kämpfen durch
Collins German Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged 7th Edition 2005. © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1980 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1997, 1999, 2004, 2005, 2007
References in classic literature ?
These are the times, when in his whale-boat the rover softly feels a certain filial, confident, land-like feeling towards the sea; that he regards it as so much flowery earth; and the distant ship revealing only the tops of her masts, seems struggling forward, not though high rolling waves, but through the tall grass of a rolling prairie: as when the western emigrants' horses only show their erected ears, while their hidden bodies widely wade through the amazing verdure.
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