All 19 Uses of
despair
in
The Mill on the Floss
- She sat as helpless and despairing among her black locks as Ajax among the slaughtered sheep.†
Chpt 1.7
- …for Maggie, becoming fascinated, as usual, by a print of Ulysses and Nausicaa, which uncle Pullet had bought as a "pretty Scripture thing," she presently let fall her cake, and in an unlucky movement crushed it beneath her foot,—a source of so much agitation to aunt Pullet and conscious disgrace to Maggie, that she began to despair of hearing the musical snuff-box to-day, till, after some reflection, it occurred to her that Lucy was in high favor enough to venture on asking for a tune.†
Chpt 1.9
- It seemed clear that Tom's despair under the caprices of the present tense did not constitute a nodus worthy of interference, and since this was the climax of his difficulties, where was the use of praying for help any longer?†
Chpt 2.1
- But he couldn't help playing with little Laura, and liking to amuse her; he even sacrificed his percussion-caps for her sake, in despair of their ever serving a greater purpose,—thinking the small flash and bang would delight her, and thereby drawing down on himself a rebuke from Mrs. Stelling for teaching her child to play with fire.†
Chpt 2.1
- She was quite crushed now, and thought of the treasures in the storeroom with no other feeling than blank despair.†
Chpt 3.3
- There is no hopelessness so sad as that of early youth, when the soul is made up of wants, and has no long memories, no superadded life in the life of others; though we who looked on think lightly of such premature despair, as if our vision of the future lightened the blind sufferer's present.†
Chpt 3.5
- The impression on his mind that it was but yesterday when he received the letter from Mr. Gore was so continually implied in his talk, and the attempts to convey to him the idea that many weeks had passed and much had happened since then had been so soon swept away by recurrent forgetfulness, that even Mr. Turnbull had begun to despair of preparing him to meet the facts by previous knowledge.†
Chpt 3.8
- It is in the slow, changed life that follows; in the time when sorrow has become stale, and has no longer an emotive intensity that counteracts its pain; in the time when day follows day in dull, unexpectant sameness, and trial is a dreary routine,—it is then that despair threatens; it is then that the peremptory hunger of the soul is felt, and eye and ear are strained after some unlearned secret of our existence, which shall give to endurance the nature of satisfaction.†
Chpt 4.2
- Her future, she thought, was likely to be worse than her past, for after her years of contented renunciation, she had slipped back into desire and longing; she found joyless days of distasteful occupation harder and harder; she found the image of the intense and varied life she yearned for, and despaired of, becoming more and more importunate.†
Chpt 6.2 *
- And Maggie was so entirely without those pretty airs of coquetry which have the traditional reputation of driving gentlemen to despair that she won some feminine pity for being so ineffective in spite of her beauty.†
Chpt 6.6
- Stephen rolled out, with saucy energy,— "Shall I, wasting in despair, Die because a woman's fair?" and seemed to make all the air in the room alive with a new influence.†
Chpt 6.7
- The middle-aged, who have lived through their strongest emotions, but are yet in the time when memory is still half passionate and not merely contemplative, should surely be a sort of natural priesthood, whom life has disciplined and consecrated to be the refuge and rescue of early stumblers and victims of self-despair.†
Chpt 6.9
- As for Stephen, he leaned back against the framework of the conservatory, dizzy with the conflict of passions,—love, rage, and confused despair; despair at his want of self-mastery, and despair that he had offended Maggie.†
Chpt 6.10
- As for Stephen, he leaned back against the framework of the conservatory, dizzy with the conflict of passions,—love, rage, and confused despair; despair at his want of self-mastery, and despair that he had offended Maggie.†
Chpt 6.10
- As for Stephen, he leaned back against the framework of the conservatory, dizzy with the conflict of passions,—love, rage, and confused despair; despair at his want of self-mastery, and despair that he had offended Maggie.†
Chpt 6.10
- But would he give her up, knowing—Philip felt the fact with heart-crushing despair—that she was made half helpless by her feeling toward him?†
Chpt 6.13
- Stephen let go her arm, and sank back on his chair, half-stunned by despairing rage.†
Chpt 6.14
- Slowly Maggie was turning away with despair in her heart.†
Chpt 7.1 *
- With that cry of self-despair, Maggie fell on her knees against the table, and buried her sorrow-stricken face.†
Chpt 7.5
Definitions:
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(despair as in: she felt despair) hopelessness; or distress (such as extreme worry or sadness from feeling powerless to change a bad situation)
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(despair as in: do not despair) lose hope or feel distress