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as in sad
feeling unhappiness the cult seemed to be a sorrowful assemblage of emotionally scarred people seeking love and redemption

Synonyms & Similar Words

Antonyms & Near Antonyms

Example Sentences

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Recent Examples of sorrowful The Pennsylvania Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA) shared a sorrowful story across their social media feeds about a mournful looking cat. Tj MacIas, Miami Herald, 10 Jan. 2025 His is a kind of pathetic that inspires neither scorn nor pity, but a universal, sorrowful connection — his yearning for a different face is a consideration of what makes a human being legible and thus able to be understood, known, even loved. Angelica Jade Bastién, Vulture, 12 Feb. 2025 Predictably, the fruit began to bleed red juice into the snow, creating crimson red rings around the snowman's eyes, giving him a sorrowful look. Michael Gfoeller and David H. Rundell, Newsweek, 16 Jan. 2025 Landman Besides the sheer sorrowful swagger and script quality of Landman, timing has proved almost everything for the Billy Bob Thornton star vehicle from Taylor Sheridan. Dominic Patten, Deadline, 30 Dec. 2024 See All Example Sentences for sorrowful
Recent Examples of Synonyms for sorrowful
Adjective
  • The mournful footnote to Hollywood or Bust is that off-set, the friendship between Martin and Lewis had already broken down irrevocably.
    Stephanie Zacharek, TIME, 19 Mar. 2025
  • Definitely — but there’s a mournful resonance to that in a play where characters reach out so desperately and remain so trapped within themselves.
    Sara Holdren, Vulture, 18 Mar. 2025
Adjective
  • Yet, whatever the deal means for Paul, Weiss, its acquiescence to Trump marks a sad day for the legal profession—or what once was a profession, and is now just another business.
    Ruth Marcus, New Yorker, 27 Mar. 2025
  • Kwong grew up hearing stories of every kind about Manzanar—scary, sad, funny and infuriating.
    Rachel Ng, Smithsonian Magazine, 27 Mar. 2025
Adjective
  • And every day, across from them, outside the clinic, about to enter or just leaving, there were women hugging each other and weeping.
    David Mamet, National Review, 11 Aug. 2022
  • The show manages to stay on the brink — always laughing, never quite weeping — for its entire length.
    Helen Shaw, Vulture, 8 Dec. 2021
Adjective
  • Despite that success, Willard was unhappy with the program’s financial commitments.
    Taylor Lyons, Baltimore Sun, 30 Mar. 2025
  • If Amazon is unhappy with season 2 of Citadel and season 1 was not all the great to begin with, this idea that the series is going to launch into some popular, sprawling spy universe for the service seems in doubt.
    Paul Tassi, Forbes.com, 29 Mar. 2025
Adjective
  • In the original visual, the Grammy winner plays a heartbroken character named Peaches who has all traces of her ex wiped from her hippocampus, an homage to Michel Gondry’s 2004 film Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.
    Hannah Dailey, Billboard, 26 Mar. 2025
  • Seven Oaks parents ‘heartbroken’ Five Seven Oaks parents reached out to the Statesman to express disappointment with the removal of the bulletin board.
    Rose Evans, Idaho Statesman, 25 Mar. 2025
Adjective
  • Swelling in the hands and feet, getting sick frequently, feeling depressed, or having wounds that are slow to heal.
    Lorena Meouchi, Vogue, 21 Mar. 2025
  • The photographer asked me to act sad and depressed, to stop smiling.
    Gaylyn Henderson, MPH, Health, 17 Mar. 2025
Adjective
  • The funeral mass for Azcona will be held Friday at 10:30am at the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart in Newark.
    Brian Niemietz, New York Daily News, 12 Mar. 2025
  • On Wednesday, Israelis lined the streets to watch the funeral procession for Bibas and her two young sons, Kfir and Ariel, who were nine-months-old and 4 years old respectively when they were taken hostage with their mother, and whose bodies were also returned and identified last week.
    Hadeel Al-Shalchi, NPR, 27 Feb. 2025
Adjective
  • Many parents, in fact, report that the worst-case scenario is not when your whole family is ill but when the adults are miserable and the under-six cohort feels just fine.
    Kathryn Schulz, New Yorker, 29 Mar. 2025
  • Scratching will just make your rash worse and your life more miserable.
    Avery Hurt, Discover Magazine, 29 Mar. 2025

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Cite this Entry

“Sorrowful.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/sorrowful. Accessed 4 Apr. 2025.

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