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pensée

American  
[pahn-sey] / pɑ̃ˈseɪ /

noun

French.
  • pensées
    plural
  1. a reflection or thought.


Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

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.

See Examples For:

Such a pensée fits with the French moralist tradition of Montaigne, Pascal and La Rochefoucauld, yet Baudelaire always regarded Edgar Allan Poe, whom he translated, as his spiritual brother.

From Washington Post May 11, 2022

Danny’s latest pensée is easily as amusing as his rumination on the 11th anniversary of the attack on the World Trade Center.

From The Guardian Jun. 29, 2018

It loved Camilla, and followed her everywhere: Henry quoted long passages about Emma Bovary and her greyhound: “Sa pensée, sans but d’abord, vagabondait au hasard, comme sa levrette, qui faisait des cercles dans la campagne....”

From "The Secret History" by Donna Tartt

The violet pensée, a beautiful violet from a mixture of manganese, one of the rarest decorations of the pâte tendre.

From The Collector's Handbook to Keramics of the Renaissance and Modern Periods by William Chaffers

No wonder it was succeeded by an arrière pensée, slightly unpleasant.

From The White Gauntlet by Mayne Reid

He dished out the bons mots with each entrance like he was a thirsty Pascal who paid for his drinks in pensées, which made him an inspiration.

From Los Angeles Times May 21, 2025

These included, most egregiously, seven extra copies of Cyril Connolly’s moody collection of pensées, “The Unquiet Grave.”

From Washington Post Jun. 10, 2020

So it must be satisfying for Donald J. Trump, the President-elect, to fire off pensées on his Twitter account, knowing that each of these thoughts, or notions—however to describe them—will be subject to analysis.

From The New Yorker Dec. 1, 2016

Pieces like Vexations and Avant-dernières pensées are ‘minimalist’ many decades before Riley, Glass or Reich.

From The Guardian Jul. 1, 2015

He admires the eruptions of that volcanic genius Dostoïevsky, but, with true European instinct, charges him with a want of "mesure"—the Greek Sophrosyne—which he defines as "l'art d'assujettir ses pensées."

From Political and Literary essays, 1908-1913 by Evelyn Baring

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