Died, squeezed by increasingly tight snake (7)
I believe the answer is:
meander
'snake' is the definition.
(I know that snake is a more specific form of the action meander)
'died squeezed by increasingly tight' is the wordplay.
'died' becomes 'd' (abbreviation next to the year of someone's death).
'squeezed by' is an insertion indicator (some letters squeezed into others).
'increasingly tight' becomes 'meaner' (I can't justify this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
'd' inserted within 'meaner' is 'MEANDER'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for meander that I've seen before include "circuitous route" , "Wander aimless" , "Wander aimlessly like a stream" , "Ramble about aimlessly" , "turning thereon?" .)