Dictionary

wreck

Pronunciation

Noun

wreck (plural wrecks)

Something or someone that has been ruined.
He was an emotional wreck after the death of his wife.
Synonyms: basket case, mess#Etymology 2|mess
The remains of something that has been severely damaged or worn down.
- To the fair haven of my native home, / The wreck of what I was, fatigued I come.
An event in which something is damaged through collision.
- 1713, Joseph Addison, Cato, published 1712, [Act 5, scene 1]:
  the wrecks of matter and the crush of worlds
- Hard and obstinate / As is a rock amidst the raging floods, / 'Gainst which a ship, of succour desolate, / Doth suffer wreck, both of herself and goods.
- Its intellectual life was thus able to go on amidst the wreck of its political life.
(legal) Goods, etc. cast ashore by the sea after a shipwreck.

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Verb

wreck (wrecks, present participle wrecking; past and past participle wrecked)

To destroy violently; to cause severe damage to something, to a point where it no longer works, or is useless.
He wrecked the car in a collision.
That adulterous hussy wrecked my marriage!
- 1610–1611, William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: Printed by Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358 ↗, [Act I, scene ii]:
  Supposing that they saw the king's ship wrecked.
To ruin or dilapidate.
(Australian English) To dismantle wrecked vehicles or other objects, to reclaim any useful parts.
To involve in a wreck; hence, to cause to suffer ruin; to balk of success, and bring disaster on.
- Weak and envied, if they should conspire, / They wreck themselves.

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