desperation
- the state of being desperate or of having the recklessness of despair.
- the act or fact of despairing; despair.
Origin of desperation
Synonym study
Related Words for desperation
heartache, gloom, melancholy, anxiety, pain, agony, sorrow, grief, discomfort, despair, misery, fear, anguish, desolation, unhappiness, madness, defiance, distress, dejection, despondencyExamples from the Web for desperation
Contemporary Examples of desperation
Stories of war, death, fear and desperation do not have happy endings.
What does our desperation to get a nuclear deal at all costs say to the modern-day Iranian Solzhenitsyns rotting in Evin prison?
They were shouting with a mixture of fury and desperation about their families in Kobani, under siege just across the line.
Perhaps, instead, they had reached a desperation we can't quite fathom.
They allowed us to capture the complicated relationship between poverty and family bonds, between community pride and desperation.
Filming a Beautiful Town in Decay: ‘Rich Hill’ and the Elusive American DreamTracy Droz Tragos
July 27, 2014
Historical Examples of desperation
But, nerved as he was by desperation, he found the task greater than he could compass.
Brave and BoldHoratio Alger
At last in desperation you embody it in a poem, an essay, a story.
Ballads of a BohemianRobert W. Service
Burke inquired in desperation before the plaintive outburst.
Within the LawMarvin Dana
Her desperation lent her invention; just in this one way he must not find her out.
Quaint CourtshipsVarious
Perhaps in desperation you may assume the role of cook yourself.
A Woman TenderfootGrace Gallatin Seton-Thompson
desperation
- desperate recklessness
- the act of despairing or the state of being desperate
Word Origin and History for desperation
mid-14c., from Middle French désperation or directly from Latin desperationem (nominative desperatio) "despair, hopelessness," noun of action from past participle stem of desperare "lose hope" (see despair (v.)).