Meaning of big fish in a small pond | Babel Free

Definitions

One who has achieved a high rank or is highly esteemed, but only in a small, relatively unimportant, or little known location or organization.

idiomatic

Equivalents

Examples

“Dr. Jones could get a professorship at an Ivy League university, but he enjoys being a big fish in a small pond too much to ever leave Hannover College.”

“[Arnold] Toynbee worries about the psychosomatic effects when an individual has a constant stature yet finds himself living in complexes of ever-increasing magnitude. In a community small enough to identify with, yet large enough to offer sufficient choices, man need not be either a big fish in a small pond or a small fish in a big pond.”

“No doubt many would feel that being a big fish in a small pond for a small time is not enough. Fortunately the system could and would continue to work well without such people.”

“Then there is the profile, desired or acquired, by opera houses, how much they are prepared to spend being a measure of how keen they are on international prestige. The big names they draw are not big fish in small ponds. They are big on the international circuit, which fosters the kind of cultural mixing (in aesthetic, organizational, managerial, and financial terms) that operates in a very pronounced way in opera today, as well as in the performance arts aspiring to its status and scale.”

“He [Jack Spicer] had come to New York to escape the claustrophobia of being a big fish in a small pond, and to make his way as a writer.”

“Indeed, Josh [White]'s status throughout the 1950s would often be that of a big fish in a small pond. The major labels, films, and network television shows were barred to him, but the newer, smaller folk promoters considered him an established star, and some, at least, assumed that his price would be out of their reach.”

“["]I'd have gotten promotion, so I would have been higher up in a smaller organization." / "What's wrong with that? Big fish in a small pond, right?"”

“Most of the businesses are big fish in small ponds, holding sway in a local area but wielding little market or political power on a national or even regional scale.”

CEFR level