brooding
Americanadjective
-
preoccupied with depressing, morbid, or painful memories or thoughts.
a brooding frame of mind.
-
cast in subdued light so as to convey a somewhat threatening atmosphere.
Dusk fell on the brooding hills.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Etymology
Origin of brooding
First recorded in 1810–20 brooding for def. 1; 1640–50 brooding for def. 2; brood + -ing 2
Explanation
When you're dwelling on something, you're brooding about it — this can be thoughtful or morbidly obsessed. When you're brooding, you might be depressed about something you just can't stop thinking about — like the lead character in Hamlet. Brooding can also mean you're being extremely thoughtful, contemplative, meditative, musing, reflective, or ruminative — those are all good things. You have to look at the context to see if someone is brooding in a positive or negative way. This is also a word for what chickens and other egg-laying animals do: sitting on eggs to help them hatch.
Vocabulary lists containing brooding
Words to Know Before You Defrost the Bird
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Bless Me, Ultima
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Unit 1: Telling Details
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Brooding Niki, meanwhile, has the skill and the perfect pitch.
From Los Angeles Times • May 29, 2026
Brooding and theatrical, Amulet earned a Washington Area Music Award nomination and a spot headlining H Street joint Pie Shop with its hard-driving rock ballads.
From Washington Post • Aug. 24, 2022
Brooding and enigmatic, and evoking vivid gestures — a 2 a.m. bummed cigarette, keeping vampire hours, the grimy romance of city living — the album doesn't sound dated.
From Salon • Aug. 26, 2018
Brooding over it is one of England’s finest castles, an impressive ring of towers and crenellations around a Norman keep.
From The Guardian • Feb. 16, 2016
Brooding the fuzzy, white eyas had calmed him down once.
From "Frightful's Mountain" by Jean Craighead George
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
