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despair
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despair as in:  she felt despair

show 10 more with this conextual meaning
  • She rescued me from despair.
    despair = hopelessness or distress
  • I was in deep despair when she introduced me to a better way to live.
    despair = hopelessness
  • She was in a state of constant despair for the last year of her life.
  • The old man, Uchendu, saw clearly that Okonkwo had yielded to despair and he was greatly troubled.   (source)
  • It was the bitter smell of despair. Even if he could somehow climb Big Thumb, he knew he wouldn't find water.   (source)
  • Despair settled like a stone in the pit of Meg's stomach.   (source)
    despair = distress
  • I did not see Frau Holtzapfel laid out flat on Himmel Street, her arms out wide, her screaming face in total despair.   (source)
  • She fell to her knees and sank into a dark hole of despair and disbelief.   (source)
    despair = feeling of hopelessness or distress
  • Steam was billowing from under the crumpled hood; Hedwig was shrieking in terror; a golf-ball-size lump was throbbing on Harry's head where he had hit the windshield; and to his right, Ron let out a low, despairing groan.   (source)
    despairing = distressed
  • But each time a new group of kids shows up and Lev isn't among them, a sense of despair worms its way through Connor's gut.   (source)
    despair = distress (at not knowing how to improve a bad situation)
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show 88 more with this conextual meaning
  • And my emotions were similarly amplified: The highs were higher; the periods of despair were deeper and darker.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • He shared few memories, and though the other two encouraged him, he couldn't imagine a future. ... Given the dismal record of raft-bound men, Mac's despair was reasonable.   (source)
  • For a moment he froze, consumed with despair.   (source)
    despair = a feeling of hopelessness
  • They ate it by the handfuls, saying they wouldn't dream of sitting with the dead without eating seeds. Seeds kept the living from despair, they explained.   (source)
    despair = a feeling of hopelessness or distress
  • In despair, Curly headed for the portable latrines.   (source)
  • Grace's despair exploded in anger.   (source)
    despair = distress (at not knowing how to improve a bad situation)
  • Then the enemy formation appeared, and Ender's weariness turned to despair. The enemy outnumbered him a thousand to one...   (source)
    despair = a feeling of hopelessness or distress
  • Don't listen to words of despair, Mattie.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • "I didn't get any pass," he groaned; with the sliding despair of his face and his clenched hands, that's what it was; a groan.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness and distress
  • It was one of complete despair and horror, for losing Bing, for being so foolish as to think she could use faith to change fate.   (source)
    despair = distress (at not knowing how to improve a bad situation)
  • They all knew that this haughty man was on his way to meet with their council, and that before night fell he would hold their very lives in his hand. Resignation and despair settled over the household that evening, as though...   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • He didn't know that in some places, like the country that Rahel came from, various kinds of despair competed for primacy. ...personal turmoil dropped by at the wayside shrine of the vast ... turmoil of a nation. That Big God howled like a hot wind... Then Small God... Inured by the confirmation of his own inconsequence … laughed a hollow laugh, and skipped away cheerfully.   (source)
    despair = distress (at inability to fix a bad situation)
  • My writing has raised me somewhat from "the depths of despair."   (source)
    despair = distress (at not knowing how to improve a bad situation)
  • Maybe this was a hallucination being brought on by all his grief and despair.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • The failed uprising plunged the whole country into despair again.   (source)
    despair = a feeling of hopelessness
  • Through the streets and suburbs of Haarlem, I bumped on my bicycle rims, bringing the message that joy runs deeper than despair.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness or distress
  • Sometimes she gave up in despair and she just lay weeping in the pitch darkness.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • Her voice was ragged with despair.   (source)
  • Gerald hung up in despair.   (source)
  • And a train arrives at an hour of despair.   (source)
  • Drive out despair, and you will keep death away from yourselves.   (source)
  • Let us not wallow in the valley of despair, I say to you today, my friends.   (source)
  • I oskillate (mispronounces oscillate) between hope and despair for this world as well, Sam.   (source)
  • He wanted to pour out to her in torrents of self-pity all his unbearable loneliness and despair and warn her never to leave the boric acid or the aspirin in reach of the children or to cross a street against the traffic light.   (source)
    despair = feelings of hopelessness or distress
  • And he began to see that there might be some sense in that last line about getting your heart's desire and getting despair along with it.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • ...for despair is only for those who see the end beyond all doubt.   (source)
  • Each time, he'd cycle through feelings of anger, regret, longing, hope, despair, longing, anger, regret.   (source)
    despair = a feeling of hopelessness
  • The passage from hope to despair   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • She pressed the back of her hand to her eyes, trying to dam the outbreak of a despair she had not permitted herself to acknowledge; she had not known the extent of it, nor how little of her endurance the quest had left her.   (source)
  • I was convinced we must care about people; we must reach out to help them in their despair.   (source)
    despair = feeling of hopelessness or distress
  • Oh, I have seen plenty since and have felt the shattering waves of violence and despair and confusion.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • He spat out the word with the deepest despair I have ever heard in a human voice.   (source)
  • (Fanfare, shorter but nearer) NORFOLK (Despairing) Oh, my God.   (source)
    despairing = with distress or without hope
  • But at this moment the general despair broke down into a multitude of individual quarrels.   (source)
    despair = desperation
  • And then, in a voice of despair, "Oh, Linda, forgive me."   (source)
    despair = distress
  • He was worried now — there was a quality of nervous despair in Daisy's letters.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness and distress
  • Their figures are bent, their faces full of grief, despair, haste, and resignation.   (source)
    despair = distress (at inability to improve a bad situation)
  • First the look of despair faded out; then came a faint flush of hope; here eyes grew deep and bright as morning stars.   (source)
    despair = distress (at not knowing how to improve a bad situation)
  • ...must show neither surprise nor despair,   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • He was in despair.   (source)
  • it was pitiful to see her so brave and yet so sorrowful, and in such a depth of despair.   (source)
  • It was then that Bagheera lifted up his dripping chin, and in despair gave the Snake's Call for protection—"We be of one blood, ye and I"—for he believed that Kaa had turned tail at the last minute.   (source)
    despair = distress
  • I had already experienced it several times, and always in periods of utmost despair.   (source)
    despair = distress (at not knowing how to improve a bad situation)
  • After such exaltation, his sudden reward was radical gloom, a hangover that bordered on despair.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • "Oh, don't!" said Phyllis, in despair; "this is truly dreadful!"   (source)
    despair = distress
  • For those near to her the despair was fearful to behold. She was convinced that her life was over, her life and children's.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • The old-timer on Sulphur Creek was right, he thought in the moment of controlled despair that ensued:   (source)
    despair = distress (at inability to fix a bad situation)
  • To-night the pressure of accumulated misgivings sent the scale drooping toward despair, and her indifference was the more chilling after the flush of joy into which she had plunged him by dismissing Denis Eady.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • So for two weeks more Jurgis fought with the demon of despair.   (source)
  • It seemed strange that ... the feeling which gave one of them such happiness should bring the other such despair.   (source)
    despair = distress (at inability to improve a bad situation)
  • The men in blue were intent with the despair of their circumstances and they seized upon the revenge to be had at close range.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • GAEV. [In despair] My sister, my sister. ...   (source)
    despair = distress (at not knowing how to improve a bad situation)
  • I tried to puzzle it out, but gave it up in despair and set the matter aside until night should bring an explanation.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • They went toward the Seine in despair, shivering with cold.   (source)
  • Breathless and in despair he fell on his back, expecting death to come immediately.   (source)
  • you can imagine what a state of despair he will be in when he wakens and misses the manuscript.   (source)
    despair = distress (at inability to fix a bad situation)
  • A strange sense of helplessness fell upon the girls as the gray bonnet vanished round the corner, and despair seized them when a few minutes later Miss Crocker appeared, and said she'd come to dinner.   (source)
    despair = a feeling of hopelessness
  • With the superstition common to his brotherhood, he fancied himself given over to a fiend, to be tortured with frightful dreams and desperate thoughts, the sting of remorse and despair of pardon, as a foretaste of what awaits him beyond the grave.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • And she wrung her hands in despair.   (source)
    despair = distress (at not knowing how to improve a bad situation)
  • The soul does not surrender to despair until it has exhausted all illusions.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • Alice had no idea what to do, and in despair she put her hand in her pocket, and pulled out a box of comfits, (luckily the salt water had not got into it), and handed them round as prizes.   (source)
    despair = distress (at not knowing how to improve a bad situation)
  • I saw that some ten or twelve vibrations would bring the steel in actual contact with my robe, and with this observation there suddenly came over my spirit all the keen, collected calmness of despair.   (source)
    despair = distressed (at not knowing how to improve a bad situation)
  • At last my mother gave up, in despair.   (source)
    despair = distress (at not knowing how to improve a bad situation)
  • You have hope, and the world before you, and have no cause for despair.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • Despair is in my heart.   (source)
  • his face suffused with fury and despair.   (source)
  • The madness and despair of many hours unloads itself in this outburst.   (source)
    despair = distress (at inability to improve a bad situation)
  • Still he did not see this, and he climbed down full of despair.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • They had just noticed this when a cry of despair broke from every animal's throat.   (source)
    despair = distress
  • The routine of adversity, the gradual decay of youthful loves and youthful hopes, the quiet despair (hardly felt as pain) of ever overcoming the chronic temptations with which we have again and again defeated them, the drabness which we create in their lives and the inarticulate resentment with which we teach them to respond to it--all this provides admirable opportunities of wearing out a soul by attrition.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • When the boulder began to slip and the animals cried out in despair at finding themselves dragged down the hill, it was always Boxer who strained himself against the rope and brought the boulder to a stop.   (source)
    despair = distress
  • All at once there came a bloodcurdling shriek, filled with hatred and despair. Gollum was defeated. He dared go no further.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • "And then it'll be about two years more before you can ride."
    Jody cried out in despair, "I'll be grown up."   (source)
    despair = distress (at inability to fix a bad situation)
  • And I wish I had the power to tell them that the despair of their hearts was not to be final, and their night was not without hope.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • They too are breathing now with a deep groaning sound; looking back once, their gaze sweeps across us with in their eyes a wild, sad, profound and despairing quality as though they had already seen in the thick water the shape of the disaster which they could not speak and we could not see.   (source)
    despairing = hopeless
  • He heard also a deep groan of despair.   (source)
    despair = desperation
  • There is, of course, always the chance, not of chloroforming the shame, but of aggravating it and producing Despair.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • I am young, I am twenty years old; yet I know nothing of life but despair, death, fear, and fatuous superficiality cast over an abyss of sorrow.   (source)
    despair = distress (at inability to improve a bad situation)
  • In despair and not knowing what else to do, poor little Bilbo caught hold of it and was pushed over the edge with it.   (source)
    despair = distress (at not knowing how to improve a bad situation)
  • It seems to me that the end which I now carry alone has no weight, as though it coasts like a rushing straw upon the furious tide of Jewel's despair.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • It was a great formidable cry of anger and despair, a deep, loud 'Oh-o-o-o-oh!' that went humming on like the reverberation of a bell.   (source)
    despair = desperation
  • Sometimes I am almost in despair.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • The fear and despair they had felt a moment earlier were drowned in their rage against this vile, contemptible act.   (source)
    despair = distress
  • They cannot persist without solace, without illusion, they are disordered before the naked picture of despair.   (source)
    despair = distress (at inability to improve a bad situation)
  • If, on the other hand, by steady and cool-headed application here and now you can finally secure his soul, he will then be yours forever--a brim-full living chalice of despair and horror and astonishment which you can raise to your lips as often as you please.   (source)
    despair = hopelessness
  • That's what they mean by the womb of time: the agony and the despair of spreading bones, the hard girdle in which lie the outraged entrails of events.   (source)
  • Then they knew that Gandalf was going to leave them at the very edge of Mirkwood, and they were in despair.   (source)
    despair = distress (at inability to improve a bad situation)
  • It cannot be that it has gone, the yearning that made our blood unquiet, the unknown, the perplexing, the oncoming things, the thousand faces of the future, the melodies from dreams and from books, the whispers and divinations of women; it cannot be that this has vanished in bombardment, in despair, in brothels.   (source)
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despair as in:  do not despair

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  • Don't despair--help is on the way!
  • I never despaired and eventually I found a good job.
    despaired = lost hope
  • She despaired that anyone would believe her.
  • My child, do not despair.   (source)
    despair = give up hope
  • His father, Unoka, who was then an ailing man, had said to him during that terrible harvest month: "Do not despair."   (source)
  • But as a reader, I did not despair.   (source)
  • Nine hours after that bus rolled over, as all those stretchers were being carried up the hill, and everyone despairing—there was her hand coming up out of the window and everyone was shouting because there it was, a moving hand.   (source)
    despairing = losing hope
  • Once, tired of writing and rewriting until Peter was satisfied, Val despaired and said, "Write it yourself, then!"   (source)
    despaired = had a feeling of hopeless ness or distress
  • I would have despaired of the hopelessness and confusion.   (source)
    despaired = lost hope
  • With all that, why should I despair?   (source)
    despair = give up hope
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show 39 more with this conextual meaning
  • "You mustn't despair!" cried Mr Wonka. "Nothing is impossible!"   (source)
  • We mustn't despair.   (source)
  • No matter how many times he signed one, it always came back for still another signature, and he began to despair of ever being free of any of them.   (source)
    despair = lose hope
  • 'Don't despair!' said Strider.   (source)
    despair = give up hope
  • The stable hands, despairing of getting help to the track fast enough, fetched the only transportation on hand, a little runabout truck that the track starter used to motor around the course.   (source)
    despairing = losing hope
  • He would not give up the search for her plane, when all others had long since despaired, as he would not give up his mills, as he would not give up any goal he had chosen if a single chance was left.   (source)
    despaired = lost hope
  • Sometimes, I despair.   (source)
    despair = lose hope or feel distress
  • In that knowledge, despair and die!   (source)
    despair = give up hope
  • He remembered those weeks of timid indecision, during which he had looked and longed and despaired of ever having the courage to ask her.   (source)
    despaired = lost hope
  • He knew he was in the grip of the unforgivable sin, despair.   (source)
    despair = giving up hope
  • Marilla had almost begun to despair of ever fashioning this waif of the world into her model little girl of demure manners and prim deportment.   (source)
    despair = give up hope
  • But we need not despair.   (source)
  • "He's fallen down in a fit, more likely," said Phyllis, "all human aid despaired of."   (source)
    despaired = lost hope
  • Now he thought she understood him, and feared; now he was sure she did not, and despaired.   (source)
  • It is said that Mr. Turner, of the Hall, is so ill that his life is despaired of.   (source)
    despaired = thought hopeless
  • Act fourth displayed the despairing Roderigo on the point of stabbing himself because he has been told that Zara has deserted him.   (source)
    despairing = without hope
  • Do not despair.   (source)
    despair = give up hope
  • I know you will not despair. You have a manly and a proud heart.   (source)
  • Wanderers in the shadowed land despair not!   (source)
  • I, too, despaired at last, and I began my homeward journey.   (source)
    despaired = lost hope
  • They despaired, until I returned and told them that the drift was little wider than a wall.   (source)
  • What's so difficult about my personality is that I scold and curse myself much more than anyone else does; if Mother adds her advice, the pile of sermons becomes so thick that I despair of ever getting through them.   (source)
    despair = give up hope
  • Ender despaired.   (source)
    despaired = lost hope or felt extreme distress
  • He had waited so long for his breakthrough, despaired so many times, and he just wanted to be alone for a little while with a pencil and some paper and a calculator and no talking.   (source)
    despaired = lost hope
  • Suddenly, he knew that this was the goal of his restless hours, this was the pleasure he had despaired of finding, this was the celebration he had wanted.   (source)
  • There we had rumour of him, and we guess that he dwelt there long in the dark hills; but we never found him, and at last I despaired.   (source)
  • Even so they often despaired of getting their pony up, or indeed of finding a path for themselves, burdened as they were.   (source)
  • But I fear ... he knows that Despair is a greater sin than any of the sins which provoke it.   (source)
    despair = giving up hope
  • There is no need to despair; hundreds of these adult converts have been reclaimed after a I brief sojourn in the Enemy's camp and are now with us.   (source)
    despair = give up hope
  • It all depends on whether your man is of the desponding type who can be tempted to despair, or of the wishful-thinking type who can be assured that all is well.   (source)
  • It is after men have given in to the irremediable, after they have despaired of relief and ceased to think even a half-hour ahead, that the dangers of humbled and gentle weariness begin.   (source)
    despaired = lost hope
  • But, my child, do not despair, this knowledge came to him just too late!   (source)
    despair = give up hope
  • I had not despaired, nor had I yet conceived the idea of returning if set free.   (source)
    despaired = lost hope
  • I did not know the names of the towns that I was to pass through, nor could I ask information from a single human being; but I did not despair.   (source)
    despair = give up hope
  • I resolved, at least, not to despair, but in every way to fit myself for an interview with them which would decide my fate.   (source)
  • Sometimes the peasants, scared by this horrid apparition, informed me of his path; sometimes he himself, who feared that if I lost all trace of him I should despair and die, left some mark to guide me.   (source)
    despair = lose hope
  •   She is too fair, too wise; wisely too fair,
      To merit bliss by making me despair.   (source)
    despair = give up hope
  • I should have been burnt, but you may remember it rained exceedingly hard when they were going to roast me; the storm was so violent that they despaired of lighting the fire, so I was hanged because they could do no better.   (source)
    despaired = lost hope
  • He despaired at parting from so good a master, who had become his intimate friend; but the pleasure of serving him prevailed over the pain of leaving him.   (source)
    despaired = felt bad
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despair as in:  she was the despair of the team

show 9 more with this conextual meaning
  • Her schizophrenia and refusal to take medication is the despair of her parents.
  • The answers to these prayers seemed often to come in the middle of the night: many mornings I would climb onto my stool to find the watch that we had left in a hundred despairing pieces fitted together and ticking merrily.   (source)
    despairing = causing hopelessness or great distress
  • It was the despair of Lieutenant Scheisskopf's life to be chained to a woman who was incapable of looking beyond her own dirty, sexual desires to the titanic struggles for the unattainable in which noble man could become heroically engaged.   (source)
    despair = something that causes hopelessness or distress
  • If she had been six she would have been the despair of her parents.   (source)
  • The Church of England, that finest flower of our Island genius for compromise; that system, peculiar to these shores, the despair of foreign observers, which deflects the torrents of religious passion down the canals of moderation.   (source)
    despair = something that causes hopelessness or great distress
  • When he had gone half way he turned around and stared at the scene — his wife and Catherine scolding and consoling as they stumbled here and there among the crowded furniture with articles of aid, and the despairing figure on the couch, bleeding fluently, and trying to spread a copy of "Town Tattle." over the tapestry scenes of Versailles.   (source)
    despairing = causing distress and loss of hope
  • It blew up onto the hills on the old terrors, the old lusts, the old despairs.   (source)
    despairs = things that cause hopelessness
  • After supper, urged perhaps by the impish humour which was the despair of his friends in Cambridge, Mass., he often asked Philip and Hayward to come in for a chat.   (source)
    despair = something that causes hopelessness or distress
  • These "new styles" were the despair of our young nieces, who were always trying to get us into brighter colors, shorter skirts, and lower necklines.   (source)
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show 10 more examples with any meaning
  • Even from this distance she read despair in his posture.†   (source)
  • His quiet voice was filled with pain, and the depth of his despair was apparent on the features of his avatar's face.†   (source)
  • Cars ran off roads into ditches; their drivers, despairing of help, kept their engines running and were asphyxiated.†   (source)
  • She set the cups in the cleared space and piled the fallen papers on the desk with an expression of despair.†   (source)
  • We saw her look down at her stomach in despair.†   (source)
  • All I was feeling was despair.†   (source)
  • The words used to describe it—despair, fear, anxiety, obsession—do so little to communicate it.†   (source)
  • Their betrayal was based only on their despair and hatred of the human race.†   (source)
  • Just a few days before, it was shining like a halo of salvation, but now it had become a beacon of despair.†   (source)
  • By way of example, as this traveler stood before the ruins of his old home, he was not overcome by shock, indignation, or despair.†   (source)
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show 190 more examples with any meaning
  • When I heard her screaming at one of them, or weeping on the floor after an especially intense argument, or when I saw her mired in despair after a breakup, I felt guilty that she was going through this for my sake.†   (source)
  • They look on in silence, each going into their own dark place of despair, not knowing what has become of their own families.†   (source)
  • The specter of never-ending conflict with his Christian neighbors renewed Paul's feelings of despair.†   (source)
  • Day after day, week after week, Cassie would erupt in fits of anger and despair, and we never knew quite what she would say or do next.†   (source)
  • Where his eyes should've been were empty sockets-like Ares's eyes, except Charon's were totally dark, full of night and death and despair.†   (source)
  • What mattered was that Salva was on his own now He felt as though he were standing on the edge of a giant hole—a hole filled with the black despair of nothingness.†   (source)
  • Mary sat on the outdoor concrete steps with the officer standing over her, the two mirroring each other's despair and frustration.†   (source)
  • A part of me did not want Richard Parker to die at all, because if he died I would be left alone with despair, a foe even more formidable than a tiger.†   (source)
  • Walter didn't say anything as I explained the situation, but he had a strange, despairing look on his face.†   (source)
  • He had attended so many funerals, polishing his black dress shoes, finding his hat, standing in a cemetery with the same despairing question: Why are they gone and I'm still here?†   (source)
  • There was exhaustion and despair, and a lot of black humor—jokes about exploding catheter bags, other people's well-meaning idiocy, or drunken misadventures.†   (source)
  • She read in his face that it had been a place of abasement, of degradation and despair.†   (source)
  • He'd hurt too much to do anything after that, and had spent most of the day on a bench on the outskirts of the Deadheads, wallowing in despair.†   (source)
  • They infest the darkest, filthiest places, they glory in decay and despair, they drain peace, hope, and happiness out of the air around them.†   (source)
  • He'd had this feeling before, beyond the numbness and the dull despair.†   (source)
  • His mouth is expressionless, but in the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes, Werner can see despair.†   (source)
  • He leaned forward to shut the door, and the Baudelaire orphans were too overcome with despair to get a last glimpse of Mr. Poe.†   (source)
  • Ever since the child had learned to walk he had been his mother's and father's despair and delight, for there never was such a boy for wandering, for climbing up things, for getting into and out of things.†   (source)
  • But it was evident that underneath their apparent complacency, Savannah's blacks were beset by an anguish and despair that ran so deep and expressed itself with such violence that it had made Savannah the murder capital of America.†   (source)
  • He clenched his teeth against the pain and despair.†   (source)
  • When after days a ship broke apart, or the pieces of it sank, or a salvage company gave up in despair after off-loading one twenty-fifth of its cargo, islanders watched blankly with their mouths hard-set and shook their heads once or twice.†   (source)
  • All reality, I decide, is a blender where hopes and dreams are mixed with fear and despair.†   (source)
  • If she could eliminate this kind of uncertainty—when and by whom would you be touched a certain way again—you would eliminate most of the stressors of the world, and maybe, too, the wave of despair that was gathering in Mae's chest.†   (source)
  • I closed my eyes in despair.†   (source)
  • I wonder, but I don't despair.†   (source)
  • Then, one night, he broke her arm, and after that, that was four years ago, he never touched her again, went through another change, into a kind of settled, sour despair.†   (source)
  • Yeah, it's nothing," Spencer said, and inexplicably felt an overwhelming wave of despair.†   (source)
  • At first, we thought Dan had caught us—but Dan was rehearsing The Gravesend Players, unless (in despair) he had fired the lot of them and canceled the production.†   (source)
  • I thought I heard the sighs of a wild, despairing woman.†   (source)
  • A demon came at her, and a scream—not of terror or of despair, but rather a plea—burst from her throat.†   (source)
  • I can feel the despair pouring out of him as he lifts me up and wraps my legs around his waist.†   (source)
  • I grabbed her and shouted in her face and she kicked at me, and when I wouldn't let go and she couldn't force me to, she began to cry, just wordless howls of despair.†   (source)
  • She had put despair and fear aside, as if they were garments she did not choose to wear ...but now she saw that she had donned them after all.†   (source)
  • He picks it up, slowly making the connection, but when I slide down to join him, he looks more despairing than ever.†   (source)
  • And together we will try to hold back the floods of tears and despair and make it through the potholed streets of life.†   (source)
  • I'm used to Kilorn's emotions, his rare moments of despair, but this rage is something new from him.†   (source)
  • I can admit to nothing and I am in complete despair.†   (source)
  • But it wasn't the eyes themselves that caught Reynie's heart — it was their look of total despair.†   (source)
  • I felt as close to despair as I ever had in my life.†   (source)
  • Once, in despair, he referred to Prometheus, chained to a rock, his liver devoured daily by a vulture.†   (source)
  • Hit the squirrel over the head with a shovel?" said Flora's father in a squeaky, despairing voice.†   (source)
  • He was reaching a point in life where the despair and negativity were threatening to take over his life.†   (source)
  • But after four hours of standing, Hana could no longer contain her despair.†   (source)
  • It was amazing to see the recovery Chencha had made, after the state of misery and despair in which she had left.†   (source)
  • How can they be fourolds?" the man cried out in despair.†   (source)
  • Her rage, her loss, her despair.†   (source)
  • What Larry McCaslin saw in Rahel's eyes was not despair at all, but a sort of enforced optimism.†   (source)
  • Thinking that makes me sick with despair: There's no bottom to this crap.†   (source)
  • Both men collapsed onto their chairs in despair.†   (source)
  • lie looked about him in despair.†   (source)
  • I sank into deeper despair.†   (source)
  • They continue through this maze of despair.†   (source)
  • Whatever teaches us to talk to ourselves is important: whatever teaches us to sing ourselves out of despair.†   (source)
  • But without academic credentials, he despairs of ever getting published in a scholarly journal.†   (source)
  • When you are in this much pain and despair, she tells them, there is only one place to find strength.†   (source)
  • Finally, the cold and the despair turn merciful, dropping down on my mind like a dark veil, and miracle of miracles, I sleep.†   (source)
  • There are tears in his eyes, a look of despair, the same look that I saw in the eyes of the Loric on the day of the invasion.†   (source)
  • I contain and compartmentalize to a disturbing degree: In my belly-basement are hundreds of bottles of rage, despair, fear, but you'd never guess from looking at me.†   (source)
  • He turned in despair to Murtagh.†   (source)
  • He didn't let her see his sympathy, of course, but hid it behind a mask of mockery and indifference, just as she hid her despair behind rage.†   (source)
  • The cells babbled with the poignant tongues of despair licking the walls.†   (source)
  • Despairing and defeated, Mack slumped to the floor next to the bloodstain.†   (source)
  • He told of the hemorrhages in the night, of Dr Clark bleeding him and prescribing "exercise and good air," and of the ultimate religious and personal despair which had led Keats to demand his own epitaph be carved in stone as: "Here lies One Whose Name was writ in Water."†   (source)
  • "Some are born unstable, some are made unstable by their living conditions, but the result is the same: the dogs, instead of being a joy to their owners, are a worry, an expense, and often bring complete despair to an entire family," Woodhouse wrote.†   (source)
  • Whin gave a hopeless, despairing cry, screwing his eyes closed and pulling the blanket closer around himself.†   (source)
  • If I couldn't see her, then she couldn't see me; I let my jaw sag with frustration and despair, for it seemed I would never escape Hatsumomo.†   (source)
  • I would turn back, crushed, and I went on like this day after day, always with the same sense of despair.†   (source)
  • It had taken much less time than I'd thought — all the terror, the despair, the shattering of my heart.†   (source)
  • We were sitting around Ma's house in Ewing, all twelve siblings, doctors, professors all-the house as wild as it always was when we were little, our kids going crazy and our spouses numb, while Mommy's original dozen fell back into nutty behavioral patterns that would make a psychologist throw up his hands in despair-when someone shouted over the din, "Let's go to the movies!"†   (source)
  • Moreover, in his despair he has spent a night with Helen that has left her pregnant, and when Charles Wilcox attempts to exact retribution, Leonard dies of a heart attack.†   (source)
  • It's been written off, shoved beyond public consciousness and left to wallow in its own lawlessness and despair.†   (source)
  • Her feelings were too raw for her to be able to conceal them just now, and her anger and despair showed plainly on her face.†   (source)
  • Lying still, she tried to expand her senses, but the blanket of malevolence and despair was too strong, and she found she couldn't use her magic.†   (source)
  • was shattered, I was saved, I lost everything, I was given
    everything else
    something in me died, something in me was born, I only knew
    the girl was gone
    whoever I was, I would never be her again this is the way
    the world ends not with a bang but a whimper
    claim yourself claim yourself claim yourself claim
    gratitude fury love despair hope hate
    first green is gold but nothing green can stay
    don't
    try nothing
    green
    can
    stay†   (source)
  • Rather, this talk of conflagration was a way of easing the despair of watching the dream come to an end.†   (source)
  • Surrounding it was a city of despair.†   (source)
  • I felt so many different things right then: elation at my father's strange expression of tenderness, and despair for his defeat.†   (source)
  • A wave of despair struck through her at the thought and she had to stop halfway down the stairs and hold the railing, afraid her knees would buckle.†   (source)
  • I couldn't know then that I would spend the entire school year of 1958-59 in lonely isolation and despair—waiting in vain.†   (source)
  • It was a terrible hopelessness and despair.†   (source)
  • The drowning she had just witnessed had left her catatonic, virtually paralyzed with shock and despair.†   (source)
  • Man's feeling of alienation in the world creates a sense of despair, boredom, nausea, and absurdity.†   (source)
  • "This is nice," she said, pointing to a large illustration that showed a group of men in various states of despair, holding their heads, lying on the floor, or huddling in corners.†   (source)
  • And often no one around him-should he still seek the company of other vampires—no one will know that he is in despair.†   (source)
  • The lamplight, thrown upward, was not kind to his ravaged face: It showed every etched line of harshness and worry and despair.†   (source)
  • She glanced at Gerald with brief despair, and moved on.†   (source)
  • Going into the final game of the season the Rebels were 3-7, but their record did not capture the flavor of their despair.†   (source)
  • Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!'†   (source)
  • "Maybe this is our savior goat," she murmured to herself, and she would forget about her despair for a while.†   (source)
  • If Da5id weren't a hacker, Hiro would despair of his ever having enough brains to do anything.†   (source)
  • Esteban had bouts of despair because Clara treated him with the same kindness she displayed toward everybody else.†   (source)
  • And right now he was answering an urgent, despairing cry from the very heart of his own brotherhood.†   (source)
  • SUCH MOMENTS OF despair and deep frustration were common among those who worked in refugee resettlement in Clarkston.†   (source)
  • It had been a long and frightening three years, and as the months had blurred into years, fear turned to despair.†   (source)
  • Booth wandered the streets in despair.†   (source)
  • Until that time she had been a woman without a sense of urgency, a woman whose nature prepared her to wait without despair, but life in that house proved stronger than her virtue.†   (source)
  • Desolation, despair, and depression.†   (source)
  • For the closest family it takes longer, but for the most part, to some degree, they too get over their grieving and despair.†   (source)
  • But as you grow into manhood you must not despair of life, but gather strength to sustain you— can you understand that.†   (source)
  • Hope and despair, anticipation and regret, joy and anger.†   (source)
  • And then horns were honking, their ah-000gahs sounding like despairing geese.†   (source)
  • Now, Feyd-Rautha had a clear view of the gladiator's eyes, saw the cold ferocity of despair in them.†   (source)
  • One moment you're at the peak of joy, the next you're on the brink of despair.†   (source)
  • These thoughts take me to the edge of despair, so I will myself—I force myself—not to have them.†   (source)
  • "Oh, Homer," Mom said in despair.†   (source)
  • Finally, in despair, she ended up in her old denim maternity jumper, gratifyingly loose, which she had sworn she'd never wear again.†   (source)
  • Rage and despair ripped through me.†   (source)
  • It does at times reveal a certain despair over her present situation — a fact that is rather concerning.†   (source)
  • Babette would watch from a window, managing to express love, worry, exasperation and despair, hope and gloom, more or less simultaneously.†   (source)
  • Will did not know whether to weep with joy or new despair.†   (source)
  • I cover my face and grit my teeth as the tears fall, bearing the wave of despair like it is a fist, striking me.†   (source)
  • In this country the sun shineth night and day; wherefore this was beyond the Valley of the Shadow of Death and also out of the reach of Giant Despair; neither could they from this place so much as see Doubting Castle.†   (source)
  • You would never think, driving past the IBP plant in Lexington, with its colorful children's playground out front, with Wal-Mart and Burger King across the street, that a single, innocuous-looking building could be responsible for so much sudden change, hardship, and despair.†   (source)
  • In her darkest moments of despair, she asked God again and again why Adam had been taken instead of her: the survivor's guilt of a military spouse.†   (source)
  • Just when I had given up all hope and had sunk to the lowest depth of despair, out of the white wall of driving sleet, my little dog came to me.†   (source)
  • And, on that spring evening, walking up the long, dark, murmuring street toward the Boulevard, Eric was in despair.†   (source)
  • I have seen the Nisei in anger, in exuberant spirits, enthusiasm and despair, in the quiet stillness of resignation or renunciation—I've worked beside them in canneries, on farms, in Red Cross groups—I've seen them in poverty and in luxury, in cabins and stuccoed residences, struggling for higher education on meager earnings, or cushioned through college by a parent's wealth—I've known them as mill hands, lumberjacks, clerks, dressmakers, stenos, domestic servants—I've watched them waltz and jitterbug, play baseball, tennis, rugby, golf, and Ping-Pong—I've known them in sickness and in health, at weddings and births and face to face with death.†   (source)
  • In this improbable setting, a young woman named Usha Narayane shook off despair and thrived despite the odds.†   (source)
  • Toyed with women, to watch them squirm, pollinate the seeds of despair; toyed with men, to satiate their Seven Deadly Sins.†   (source)
  • Then somehow, in the midst of my fear and despair, my instinct kicked in and I suddenly felt very calm.†   (source)
  • It was then, as we despaired, that I thought of Thomas Stone.†   (source)
  • She hung her head, defeated by all they had been through these past few days, and the cold made her feel even more despair.†   (source)
  • "You don't understand," he said in despair.†   (source)
  • A familiar wave of despair floods over me and I close my eyes, trying to calm my throbbing head.†   (source)
  • He said, "Do not be despair, young bahss.†   (source)
  • It dies when the odors of hope, despair, lust, and caring are wiped out by the seasonal winds; when dust has settled into the cracks and scars, leveling their depths and discoloration—their reasons for being; when the spirit is trapped and fading in someone's memory.†   (source)
  • I don't know what to say," said Mrs. Hartman, her voice indignantly astonished, and also despairing.†   (source)
  • The memory of my youth was such a surprising relief from all the hatred and despair, blood and drugs that surrounded me.†   (source)
  • (She laughs joyously, having practically destroyed the apartment, and flings her arms up and lets them come down happily, slowly, reflectively, over her abdomen, aware for the first time perhaps that the life therein pulses with happiness and not despair) Lena†   (source)
  • Inigo looked at Fezzik in despair.†   (source)
  • The land changed to sandy fields and low scrub, and I began to despair about reaching the giants before the newlyweds celebrated their first anniversary.†   (source)
  • Fact is, there are probably lots of them-kids whose potential, whose spark, gets so dimmed by all the grime and despair that it's almost impossible to see.†   (source)
  • In Gus she had lost her ultimate ally, and felt that much more alone, but she had none of the tired despair she had felt when her children died.†   (source)
  • The constantness, varietylessness, the sheer weight of sameness drove him to despair and froze his imagination.†   (source)
  • From the violin came the cry of hungry human love demanding its mate, questing, praying, half despairing, and yet wooing, seeking again.†   (source)
  • Tried to say: Oh, no. But the words were strangled somewhere inside of her and the sound that came from her lips was a sound she had never heard before, as if she had suddenly found a new vocabulary, a new language, a language of despair and futility.†   (source)
  • Everybody could hear the helpless, cornered despair in McMurphy's voice.†   (source)
  • With this faith, we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope.†   (source)
  • I glance at the clock, antsy with despair.†   (source)
  • ON JANUARY 14, two weeks into the new year, George Washington wrote one of the most forlorn, despairing letters of his life.†   (source)
  • The rest of the week, I flip-flop between total despair and simmering rage.†   (source)
  • No, said Tomas, and filled Tereza with despair, a despair all the worse for her having grown unaccustomed to it.†   (source)
  • I knew He sent His spirit on Sundays to the church, but after all that was a church and the people had had all day Saturday to shuffle off the cloak of work and the skin of despair.†   (source)
  • "I've never known despair and I don't think I ever will," he wrote me once.†   (source)
  • In his despair he forgot his English.†   (source)
  • Oscar Danilo Blandon, the so-called Johnny Appleseed of Crack, may have been the instigator of one ripple effect, in which by his actions a single person inadvertently causes an ocean of despair.†   (source)
  • Yossarian was limp with exhaustion, pain and despair when he finished.†   (source)
  • I never dreamed, I never would have dared dream, of the great joy and despair that it would open up to me.†   (source)
  • but I think she must've been weighed down by sadness and despair before she weighed herself down with rocks.†   (source)
  • Mr. Moritz's novels are defined by their humor and compassion, and the hope they search for amid despair.†   (source)
  • A muffled cry of rage and despair shook the ground.†   (source)
  • During the past weeks I had thought I had reached the lowest point possible, but now despair pushed me even further down.†   (source)
  • It went from a kind of desperate excitement to dark despair, in gentle slow motion.†   (source)
  • The smell in the streets—a mix of refuse, horse droppings, urine, and despair—is truly awful, and I'm afraid I might gag.†   (source)
  • A warm, squirming lapful of golden puppy, licking and biting and unabashedly happy, made despair dissolve no matter how hard you were hanging on to it.†   (source)
  • It's presumption or despair, I forget which, but a mortal sin.†   (source)
  • But his despair is growing.†   (source)
  • Before he shutters his eyes, I catch something that might have been despair.†   (source)
  • All shall love me and despair!†   (source)
  • In such a narrowed world, in order to survive, you learn to contain your rage and your despair, and you try to re-create, as well as you can, your normality, some sense of things continuing.†   (source)
  • He felt that despair was not far from these does; and from all that he had heard of Efrafa, both from Holly and from Chervil, he could understand why.†   (source)
  • We all exercised in the Yard of Despair for another half hour.†   (source)
  • Chapter Seventeen Hope and Despair The journey from the Cartographer's island to the Island at the Edge of the World was the most peaceful and least eventful passage they had experienced since the original voyage from London into the Archipelago.†   (source)
  • The small seed of despair cracks open and sends experimental tendrils upward to the fragile skin of calm holding him together.†   (source)
  • "Do not despair!" he said, struggling to smile.†   (source)
  • At the time, Jean Louise was so overcome with despair at the prospect of being too old to enjoy anything when it would finally be over, she refrained from pursuing the subject.†   (source)
  • The male fish always let the female fish feed first and the hooked fish, the female, made a wild, panic-stricken, despairing fight that soon exhausted her, and all the time the male had stayed with her, crossing the line and circling with her on the surface.†   (source)
  • She stepped away from him, her face so filled with despair, Eve's heart broke.†   (source)
  • Like a flood, despair swept through Tom's chest.†   (source)
  • Every muscle in my face pulled down and I sucked in air in an attempt to wash away the despair.†   (source)
  • At what he judged to be the middle of the fifth night, Mortenson felt a wave of blackness lapping at his feet, surging up to his knees, threatening to drown him in despair.†   (source)
  • Helene puts her fingers over my mouth, her anger replaced with something like despair.†   (source)
  • By the time she reached the creek, the fury Clarke had carried into the woods had been replaced by despair.†   (source)
  • It is simply in the nature of English speakers to do this, and of some in every generation to despair.†   (source)
  • "Do I look sunk in despair?" he asked, holding his arms out from his sides.†   (source)
  • Her chest, smaller than my fist, shuddered, and she gave a cry, but so weak, so like a parting, that I was near despair.†   (source)
  • In her black cotton dress she looked like warmed-over despair.†   (source)
  • They didn't see his past despair over abstract questions of existence itself that he had abandoned in defeat.†   (source)
  • I looked out at the scene now from far back in my despair, seeing the platform and its actors as through a reversed telescope; small doll-like figures moving through some meaningless ritual.†   (source)
  • Singbe smiled a little and nodded, but Grabeau could see a tired despair in his friend's eyes.†   (source)
  • There were many dark moments when my faith in humanity was sorely tested, but I would not and could not give myself up to despair.†   (source)
  • Weeping out of control, she fell to her knees, then collapsed in the street, her screams of despair clear to the man who suddenly was above her.†   (source)
  • In the Monterrey dugout, the mood swung from eager anticipation to morbid despair.†   (source)
  • Smith, Roger noted with despair, "had a slight, knowing smile."†   (source)
  • Celia remembers how her own eyes were once like her son's—hollow sockets that attracted despair like a magnet.†   (source)
  • At first I despaired that he should live as I had, and then, eventually, I was resigned to it, as I had to be, for he never came back.†   (source)
  • In some odd sense, I felt that by saving Father from his life of despair, I would in effect save myself.†   (source)
  • The cry was involuntary; it held amusement, despair, indignation and pity.†   (source)
  • They were almost in despair before at last they came to a little muddiness and a tiny trickle of water through softer and better grass.†   (source)
  • I glanced at the faces of the other women around the fire and saw their unspoken question: Could a man—this butcher—feel the same despair and sadness that we women feel when we lose a child?†   (source)
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