Definition of "hew"
hew1
verb
third-person singular simple present hews, present participle hewing, simple past hewed or (rare) hew, past participle hewed or hewn
(transitive, intransitive) To chop away at; to whittle down; to mow down.
Quotations
Among other things he found a sharp hunting knife, on the keen blade of which he immediately proceeded to cut his finger. Undaunted he continued his experiments, finding that he could hack and hew splinters of wood from the table and chairs with this new toy.
1912 October, Edgar Rice Burroughs, “Tarzan of the Apes”, in The All-Story, New York, N.Y.: Frank A. Munsey Co.; republished as chapter 6, in Tarzan of the Apes, New York, N.Y.: A. L. Burt Company, 1914 June,
(transitive, US) To act according to, to conform to; usually construed with to.
Quotations
Inside the stories usually hewed to a consistent formula: no matter how outlandish and weird the circumstances, in the end everything had to have a natural, if not plausible, ending—frequently, though not always, involving a mad scientist.
1998, Frank M. Robinson, Lawrence Davidson, Pulp Culture: The Art of Fiction Magazines, Collectors Press, Inc., page 103
Faculty members and students alike were buzzing with the fashionable nostrums that dominated U.S. education discourse in the late sixties, […] These hewed to the recommendations of the Plowden Report, […]
2008, Chester E. Finn, Troublemaker: A Personal History of School Reform Since Sputnik, Princeton University Press, page 28
Hewing to the old comedy convention of beginning a speech by randomly referencing something in eyesight, Homer begins his talk about the birds and the bees by saying that women are like refrigerators: they’re all about six feet tall and weigh three hundred pounds and make ice cubes.
2012 May 27, Nathan Rabin, “TV: Review: THE SIMPSONS (CLASSIC): “New Kid on the Block” (season 4, episode 8; originally aired 11/12/1992)”, in The Onion AV Club
King recovered the rights on the condition that he'd stop publicly disparaging Kubrick's version. "For a long time I hewed that line," he told CBS News in June. "And then Mr. Kubrick died. So now I figured, what the hell. I've gone back to saying mean things about it."
2013 October 2, Alex Pappademas, “Leuqes! LEUQES! LEUQES! – The Shining sequel and what it says about Stephen King”, in Grantland.com, retrieved 2013-10-16
noun
countable and uncountable, plural hews
hew2
noun
countable and uncountable, plural hews