take kindly

English

Pronunciation

Audio (AU) (file)

Verb

take kindly (third-person singular simple present takes kindly, present participle taking kindly, simple past took kindly, past participle taken kindly) [+ to (object)]

(idiomatic, chiefly in the negative) To like, accept or condone.
- 1927-29, M.K. Gandhi, The Story of My Experiments with Truth, translated 1940 by Mahadev Desai, Part I, Chapter xiii:
  An English passenger, taking kindly to me, drew me into conversation. He was older than I. He asked me what I ate, what I was, where I was going, why I was shy, and so on. He also advised me to come to table. He laughed at my insistence on abjuring meat, […]
- 1961 January, “The North-East London electrification of the Great Eastern Line”, in Trains Illustrated, page 19:
  The host of business travellers between Bishops Stortford and London would scarcely take kindly to devious routing via the Southbury line; on the other hand, it is not desirable that they should overcrowd the business trains to and from Cambridge.
- 2014, Sean Platt, ‎David W. Wright, Available Darkness
  It seemed to John like the sort of place where the people all knew one another, were likely to have guns for protection, and rarely took kindly to strangers.
- 2020, Diana Klebanon, ‎Franklin L. Jonas, ‎Diana Klebanow, People's Lawyers: Crusaders for Justice in American History
  The young Darrow did not always take kindly to his father's strict ways. He was a disciplined student only when he liked what he was doing.

Usage notes

Sometimes used colloquially of inanimate objects: "the equipment did not take kindly to being stored in a damp room for months on end".

References

“not take kindly to”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.