How to Use insolent in a Sentence

insolent

adjective

• Insolent behavior will not be tolerated.
• And insolent enough to stick around when the lights come up.
  — Allison Glock, Southern Living, 11 July 2017
• And insolent enough to stick around when the lights come up.
  — Allison Glock, Southern Living, 14 Sep. 2012
• On the surface, Hyun-su is an insolent young punk trying to pick a fight with anybody who crosses his path.
  — Stephen Dalton, The Hollywood Reporter, 25 May 2017
• The play’s voice — almost instantly recognizable as the crude, insolent tenor of a 14-year-old boy’s, Rawley says — means there are a lot of vile things that get spewed.
  — Dusty Somers, The Seattle Times, 5 Sep. 2017
• Horn calls peaked the enormous tutti crescendos, and Till approached his somber end with an insolent whistle from clarinet.
  — By Libby Hanssen, kansascity.com, 3 June 2017
• Chaplin had a Hollywood studio of his own, and his mighty, insolent artistry had the intricacy, the precision, and the refinement of a Swiss watch.
  — Richard Brody, The New Yorker, 23 July 2022
• On the other: 120-year-old Vhagar, largest and oldest of the behemoths, ridden by insolent bully Aemond (Ewan Mitchell).
  — Michael Ordoña, Los Angeles Times, 15 Aug. 2023
• At the same time, her snobbish, insolent style makes her a strong irritant for blue-collar workers, helping mobilize Putin’s base.
  — Washington Post, 15 Dec. 2017
• His worst behavior is being insolent and arrogant with the school counselor.
  — Jennifer Ouellette, Ars Technica, 13 June 2020
• Elementary teachers: Wait until sweet, adorable Chuck comes to school after learning that his parents are getting divorced and becomes, for six hours a day for the rest of the year, moody, insolent and a third grade terror.
  — Valerie Strauss, Washington Post, 5 June 2017
• Shortly after leaving Nurnberg, Bernardini agreed to read manuscripts for a literary scout if the scout would pay a fee of £50 per book, then expressed regret at having been so insolent.
  — Lila Shapiro, Vulture, 4 Feb. 2022
• Ask my mother, who possesses, tucked away in her basement, the world’s largest collection of photographs of an insolent child pouting, scowling, smirking, staring at the ground, squinting at the sky or watching a squirrel in the corner of the yard.
  — Jason Gay, WSJ, 5 Aug. 2022
• In particular, the character of Roy Cohn, incarnated by Nathan Lane with insolent glee, seemed to channel the voice of the current political zeitgeist.
  — Charles McNulty, latimes.com, 26 Mar. 2018
• But the stage only lights up when Ribler’s Marchbanks is skulking around in his velvet smoking jacket, looking now anguished, now insolent, now ecstatic.
  — Washington Post, 30 Sep. 2019
• As Omari, Kory Pullman turns the nearly impossible trick of conveying a troubled young man as both a stubborn, insolent jackass and a vulnerable, hurting kid.
  — Dominic P. Papatola, Twin Cities, 5 Oct. 2019
• Within a 10-minute or so span, Kyrgios was insolent, immature, compassionate and confused.
  — Sandra Harwitt, USA TODAY, 30 Aug. 2017
• In 1778, a posthumous biography chastised the late Samuel Johnson for his bad bedside reading habits, characterizing the British writer as an insolent child.
  — Nika Mavrody, The Atlantic, 19 May 2017
• The banking powers are more despotic than a monarchy, more insolent than autocracy, more selfish than bureaucracy.
  — Letters To The Editor, The Mercury News, 22 Aug. 2019
• Dunn was a superbly insolent Mercutio, all flicking feet and snickering hands and insinuating pelvis.
  — Jeffrey Gantz, BostonGlobe.com, 16 Mar. 2018
• This lighter, hotter, sweatier version of the Italian carmaker’s decadent dual-sport could be compared to a limited-edition chronograph, a trophy to be waved under other collectors’ noses with an insolent shooting of a cuff.
  — Dan Neil, WSJ, 2 Mar. 2023
• Frankly, there’s something amusingly insolent about it, like scolding an egomaniacal lead guitarist, only to watch him unleash an indulgent, one-hour solo.
  — WSJ, 28 Oct. 2018
• Barely an hour long, the latest insolent marvel from Portuguese auteur João Pedro Rodrigues reinforces his expectedly subversive and sacrilegious tendencies, always paired with a pointedly tongue-in-cheek sense of humor.
  — Carlos Aguilar, Los Angeles Times, 1 June 2023
• Writing about Sabatini’s many bad choices and insolent remarks always requires consideration.
  — Lauren Ritchie, orlandosentinel.com, 21 June 2019
• They could go days without food or water; they could withstand burning heat …  ; and if they were horribly cruel to their captives, they could themselves accept torture with insolent defiance.
  — James A. Michener, Texas, 1985

Last Updated: 7 Dec 2024