Jean curtailed rubbish, being green? (8)
I believe the answer is:
jealousy
'green?' is the definition.
Although both the answer and definition are singular nouns, I cannot understand how one could define the other.
'jean curtailed rubbish' is the wordplay.
'curtailed' means to remove the last letter.
'rubbish' becomes 'lousy' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'jean' with its last letter removed is 'jea'.
'jea'+'lousy'='JEALOUSY'
'being' acts as a link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for jealousy that I've seen before include "Form of resentment" , "Covetousness - envy" , "bad emotion" , "Suspicious resentment" , "It is called the green-eyed monster" .)