Adjective

(en adjective)

Wanting or devouring great quantities of food.

* 1719 , , Robinson Crusoe , ch. 6:

I never had so much as . . . one wish to God to direct me whither I should go, or to keep me from the danger which apparently surrounded me, as well from voracious creatures as cruel savages.

* 1867 , , ch. 45:

The old man was up, betimes, next morning, and waited impatiently for the appearance of his new associate, who after a delay that seemed interminable, at length presented himself, and commenced a voracious assault on the breakfast.

* 1910 , , "The Human Drift":

Retreating before stronger breeds, hungry and voracious , the Eskimo has drifted to the inhospitable polar regions.

Having a great appetite for anything (e.g., a voracious reader ).

* 1922 , , ch. 7:

If he carried chiefly his appetite, a zeal for tiled bathrooms, a conviction that the Pullman car is the acme of human comfort, and a belief that it is proper to tip waiters, taxicab drivers, and barbers, but under no circumstances station agents and ushers, then his Odyssey will be replete with good meals and bad meals, bathing adventures, compartment-train escapades, and voracious demands for money.

* 2005 , Nathan Thornburgh, " The Invasion of the Chinese Cyberspies," Time , 29 Aug.:

Methodical and voracious , these hackers wanted all the files they could find.

Adjective

(en adjective)

Marked by extreme and violent energy.

* {{quote-news

, year=2011 , date=October 1 , author=Tom Fordyce , title=Rugby World Cup 2011: England 16-12 Scotland , work=BBC Sport citation , page= , passage=Scotland needed a victory by eight points to have a realistic chance of progressing to the knock-out stages, and for long periods of a ferocious contest looked as if they might pull it off.}}

Extreme or intense.