How to Use high-wire in a Sentence

high-wire

adjective
Definition of high-wirenext
  • The Bruins had taken their high-wire act to new heights while improving to 8-0.
    — Ben Bolch, Los Angeles Times, 20 Oct. 2023
  • The music, as Spiegelman notes, has to be tuned into, tracked among the acrobatics of wordage, the high-wire leaps of thought.
    — Carol Muske-Dukes, Washington Post, 1 Mar. 2023
  • Enter Email Sign Up His high-wire legal act hit a new challenge this month.
    — Jonathan Swan, BostonGlobe.com, 22 Aug. 2023
  • But Weaver and the Reds bullpen pulled off the high-wire act most of the rest of the way, escaping sizable jams in the fourth, fifth and eighth innings – before Salvador Perez’s tying shot in the ninth.
    — Gordon Wittenmyer, The Enquirer, 13 June 2023
  • That’s the high-wire act that creator Jesse Armstrong, whose previous shows were comedies, managed to pull off.
    — Rachel Dodes, ELLE, 31 May 2023
  • Taking on Trump could be a high-wire act considering that DeSantis would need to win over at least a slice of his diehard base.
    — Tal Axelrod, ABC News, 16 May 2023
  • Then there’s the movie’s ringmaster, Greta Gerwig, who co-wrote the movie with partner Noah Baumbach and directed the high-wire act.
    — Borys Kit, The Hollywood Reporter, 4 Aug. 2023
  • And producers, who face a financial high-wire act even in the best of times, have made some not-to-subtle calculations.
    — Tim Balk, New York Daily News, 27 Apr. 2024
  • Philippe Petit, the high-wire artist, had wanted to visit Edge, the hundredth-floor observation deck at Hudson Yards, for a long time.
    — Bob Morris, The New Yorker, 5 Aug. 2024
  • What would normally be a routine Fed meeting is shaping up to be a high-wire balancing act.
    — Alexander Kurov, Fortune, 20 Mar. 2023
  • Reds reliever Fernando Cruz completed a high-wire act in the 10th inning by entering the game with two outs and the bases loaded.
    — Charlie Goldsmith, The Enquirer, 3 June 2023
  • The result is a madcap high-wire act of choreography and comedy.
    — Tyler Coates, The Hollywood Reporter, 30 Oct. 2023
  • Each of the five leaders is engaged in a high-wire act, trying to pursue reforms without triggering a backlash.
    — Judd Devermont, Foreign Affairs, 11 June 2019
  • This is a high-wire act for both Brazilian democracy and the climate that requires uncommon balance.
    — Andre Pagliarini, The New Republic, 25 May 2023
  • Thomas rejected the high-wire act that girls who have wanted to make progress have been told to perfect—that dance between using girlhood as a shield and turning it into a weapon.
    — Mattie Kahn, Glamour, 14 June 2023
  • Could our patron saint of modern cinematic womanhood pull off this high-wire act?
    — Lisa Wong MacAbasco, Vogue, 18 July 2023
  • Each show is a feat of improvisation, and part of the appeal is witnessing this high-wire act alongside fellow travelers.
    — Charlie Warzel, The Atlantic, 22 June 2024
  • Over that time span, Republicans have regularly carried out a high-wire act.
    — Paul Kane, Washington Post, 27 May 2023
  • South American qualifying, for so long such a high-wire act, now operates with a colossal safety net.
    — Rory Smith, New York Times, 20 Oct. 2023
  • Doing both at once, as unfolded in dozens of summer school classrooms around Portland this summer, is a high-wire act for both Younie and her unsuspecting students.
    — oregonlive, 6 Aug. 2023
  • Even knowing that there’s a fall and an eventual rescue, the high-wire drama of everything that follows makes for stomach-knotting, heart-racing reading.
    — Nancy Lord, Anchorage Daily News, 16 Apr. 2023
  • The hand-raising moment illustrated the high-wire act that is Mr. Pence’s campaign — embracing Trumpism, while distancing himself from it.
    — Jonathan Weisman, New York Times, 24 Aug. 2023
  • Harrison had escaped one jam an inning earlier, but the Giants’ skipper wouldn’t give him the leeway to navigate another high-wire act.
    — Evan Webeck, The Mercury News, 12 July 2024
  • Wide-eyed spectators wandered freely through Egyptian and Medieval Courts, delighted in high-wire circus acts, and were transported by a 4,000-piece orchestra.
    — Yannic Rack, Smithsonian Magazine, 29 Aug. 2023
  • For artists, the live entertainment industry has always been a bit of a high-wire act, but since the pandemic, it’s become more like juggling flaming torches on a unicycle, while covered in gasoline.
    — Seth Yudof, Rolling Stone, 16 Oct. 2023
  • Her audience’s eyes were still recovering from her high-wire gyrations, her postapocalyptic backup ravers, and her many, many lasers.
    — Spencer Kornhaber, The Atlantic, 15 Dec. 2023
  • American Airlines and United both had to navigate the high-wire act of negotiating new pilots union contracts—and both did so successfully.
    — Bypaolo Confino, Fortune, 22 Sep. 2023
  • If no coalition can be formed, the parties will have to try to pass legislation on a case-by-case basis — a high-wire act whose failure would result in an impasse, perhaps even diminishing France’s influence on the European and global stage.
    — Alexander Smith, NBC News, 9 July 2024
  • The Kings found their television queue, full of serialized show after serialized show, many with high-wire concepts and a limited number of episodes, increasingly daunting to watch instead of being a source of respite after a long day of work.
    — Yvonne Villarreal, Los Angeles Times, 4 Apr. 2024
  • None of this high-wire act would work without Gilpin’s almost athletic ability to sustain both tones at once, to be both hilarious and gutting, to infuse every moment of desperate prayer or laughable farce with deep, human gravitas.
    — Phillip MacIak, The New Republic, 9 May 2023

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'high-wire.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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