Dictionary — ontologydriven

close to the bone en · ADJ

(of a comment, usually) Penetrating and relatable, to the point of causing discomfort.
- First came the plague, then the flood, and now the fire. This has been a biblical summer, one where the doomsday warnings of climate scientists have felt increasingly close to the bone. 2021 August 6, Gaby Hinsliff, “Johnson’s muddle over Covid is a foretaste of his thinking on climate change.”, in The Guardian:
- The author now brings economics to the personal level, asking and pondering these uneasy, but close-to-the-bone questions: Are we economic people or self-developing persons? Should we look to the proletariat or to all those who love life? Are we suffering from exploitation or from negative symbiosis? 1977 December 10, Arnold W. Klassen, “Looking For Alternatives: A New Political Analysis”, in Gay Community News, volume 5, number 23, page 13:
- So it’s morally complex and sometimes uncomfortably close to the bone, but also lushly bawdy and funny, and packaged together with an astonishing degree of cinematic brio by first-time writer-director Marielle Heller. 2015 August 6, Leslie Felperin, “The Diary of a Teenage Girl review – a scaldingly honest coming-of-age comedy”, in The Guardian:
Destitute.
- We've lived close to the bone and saved every cent we could, and there's no undisputed claim now that we can't cash… 1916, Albert Bigelow Paine, quoting Mark Twain, chapter 53, in The Boys’ Life of Mark Twain:

Spelling	Features	Labels	Source
closer to the bone	Degree=Cmp		lexicographic
closest to the bone	Degree=Sup		lexicographic