toggle menu
menu
vocabulary
1000+ books

pretext
in a sentence

show 189 more with this conextual meaning
  • On the pretext that the private office was needed for something else, Miep took Mr. Dussel upstairs, opened the bookcase and stepped inside, while Mr. Dussellooked on in amazement.†   (source)
  • And yet every time I devised some pretext to get her on her own, here he came, thump thump thump, sheepish grin, arm around her shoulder, wrecking everything.†   (source)
  • Chacko was a self-proclaimed Marxist He would call pretty women who worked in the factory to his room, and on the pretext of lecturing them on labor rights and trade union law, flirt with them outrageously.†   (source)
  • On the pretext of handing over the weapons he had bought, they took him into the yard of the agricultural college and shot him there.†   (source)
  • Hemme gave up all pretext of lecture and lay in wait for the next tardy student.†   (source)
  • Dr. Urbino was reluctant to confess his hatred of animals, which he disguised with all kinds of scientific inventions and philosophical pretexts that convinced many, but not his wife.†   (source)
  • The field commandant will hold the shuttle here until dawn on a pretext.†   (source)
  • For a moment, as he said this, the fear passed through me that we'd misjudged things badly; that for all we knew, veterans often used talk of possibles just as a pretext to go on trips, and didn't really expect to take it any further.†   (source)
  • Mameha was very clear that we ought to wait until we heard from them, rather than finding some pretext for approaching them again, but at length she could bear the suspense no longer and went to check on Uchida one afternoon.†   (source)
  • One is a pretext and the other is my real objective.†   (source)
  • Told the deputy if he called me to his office on some pretext or other, maybe I could tell him who killed the Clutters.†   (source)
  • On the very next day, on the credible pretext of trying to find celery for the Thanksgiving stuffing, Alice and I headed downtown for tup kuneh.†   (source)
  • The pose of chauffeur was convenient because I could travel under the pretext of driving my master's car.†   (source)
  • This intelligence was scant, but provided a pretext upon which the entire tale could be rehashed.†   (source)
  • She made a pretext of cutting up my meat, and as she cut, she whispered in bite-sized phrases: "Please … Senorita … Sandi… you must… come to … my house."†   (source)
  • Lydia Sessions made this an immediate pretext for getting down and coming in.†   (source)
  • Or perhaps Gaea's forces had arranged some pretext to keep the tourists and construction workers away.†   (source)
  • I think the Volturi were waiting for this—for some pretext.†   (source)
  • Ferula had turned down two suitors on the pretext of her mother's illness.†   (source)
  • She had only to stretch her neck or rise on some pretext to see twenty or forty undressed males lounging or playing ball in the sunlight.†   (source)
  • For every full-fledged deserter there were a half-dozen others inclined to stroll off on almost any pretext, to do a little clam digging perhaps, or who might vanish for several weeks to see wives and children, help with the harvest at home, or ply their trades for some much-needed "hard money."†   (source)
  • I took my concerns to Elinor, who had the idea of sending for the children on the pretext of some employment in the Gowdies' physick garden.†   (source)
  • The pretext had been a piece on women truck drivers.†   (source)
  • "That is his pretext, not his reason," declared Ser Godry.†   (source)
  • One time, agents took him to a room and grilled him, trying, he thought, to make him angry, trying, he imagined, to create a pretext for rescinding his green card.†   (source)
  • ON ANY PRETEXT …. because he can't stand the shadow of a man flickering around the edges of a house ….†   (source)
  • All we need is some pretext for going down to our ship today and taking stuff on board.†   (source)
  • When I offer the bloody nose pretext, he assesses me head to foot.†   (source)
  • It would have been easier if Eduardo had come up to be a natural buffer for me, a screen, and perhaps also to provide the pretext by which I might depart.†   (source)
  • If such a conspiracy happened, the army could be raised—using any pretext—and used in the usurpation scheme.†   (source)
  • Peking would move quickly and take over, using the pretext of the ninety-seven treaty.†   (source)
  • In the bad days we were even advised to find some pretext of changing our hotel rooms as soon as we registered.†   (source)
  • This he presently confesses to Domenico, though only after having enticed that informer into foolishly bending over and putting his head into a curious black box, on the pretext of showing him a pornographic diorama.†   (source)
  • Like you, sir, I have abandoned that pathetic faith with its pretexts and evasions.†   (source)
  • He had linked the two companies in some way, borrowed a million dollars for our company on the strength of our oil, and transferred the money on some pretext to his own company.†   (source)
  • He developed small dishonesties, borrowed insignificant sums from secretaries and neglected to return them, arrived late or left early under some mumbled pretext.†   (source)
  • Everyone on the railway knew that a strike was coming and only a pretext was needed for it to begin.†   (source)
  • To this perpetual accusation Elizabeth had never replied; she merely regarded her aunt with a wide-eyed, insolent stare, meant at once to register her disdain and to thwart any pretext for punishment.†   (source)
  • It used to be that she ran about on some pretext or other, and for a while she made soft-voiced explanations that nobody could hear, and after that she began to charge up bills, which the postmistress declared would never be paid any more than anyone else's, even if the Farrs were too good to associate with other people.†   (source)
  • All the other members of the family had gone, deserting the kitchen table on one pretext or another.†   (source)
  • That's their pretext for going after you.†   (source)
  • But if she did that, he would have taken it as a pretext for trying to structure her life.†   (source)
  • And he immediately took this as a pretext to berate her.†   (source)
  • She tried to get near him under any pretext.†   (source)
  • I will find some duty for Ser Rolph, some pretext to send him away.†   (source)
  • Robb wants me safe, I cannot fault him for that, but his pretext is growing threadbare.†   (source)
  • This would have given opponents another pretext to talk against the judiciary.†   (source)
  • Oh, there was some other pretext, but that was the real reason.†   (source)
  • Any number of pretexts would do, but primarily military high-tech espionage.†   (source)
  • He offered demonstrations on the slightest pretext.†   (source)
  • First, with the pretext of taking the burden off his wife, he transferred his parties.†   (source)
  • Tyrion waited until she was done and said, "Stannis must have some pretext to justify his rebellion.†   (source)
  • Get the men aboard with this false pretext and seize the ships when the fleet is out to sea.†   (source)
  • This would give the government a good pretext to claim more powers than were granted.†   (source)
  • These and similar pretexts are always available, whether true or false.†   (source)
  • Then winkle them out of their pyramids on some pretext.†   (source)
  • Get the heads of all the noble houses out of their pyramids on some pretext, Daario had said.†   (source)
  • But the pretexts of laws, alone, have made Negroes property.†   (source)
  • This was to give Hizdahr a pretext to kill the dragons.†   (source)
  • The slightest pretext was enough to launch the imagination on an orgy of self-torture.†   (source)
  • Can't think of a pretext to keep them?†   (source)
  • If he just shifted his chair an inch or so to the right… on the pretext of shifting himseli closer to the table, he managed it.†   (source)
  • I lay my hand on her head and under the pretext of lifting her eyelid a little, I pressed my finger against the bruise on her temple, hard.†   (source)
  • It's obviously a pretext.†   (source)
  • He had been summoned back from the Fremen and had his orders from Hawat—"Under pretext of guarding her, you will keep the Lady Jessica under constant surveillance."†   (source)
  • On some professional pretext or other he went to live in the interns' quarters at Misericordia Hospital, returning home only to change his clothes before making his evening house calls.†   (source)
  • Hagrid now bent down on the pretext of reading the S.P.E.W. notebook as well, and said in a whisper so low that only Harry could hear it, "Harry, meet me tonight at midnight at me cabin.†   (source)
  • "Magnus" was fiction; she made him up as she went along, but Bjurman took her account as a pretext for meticulously mapping out her sex life.†   (source)
  • The dough wasn't yet over the top of the pan where she'd put it to rest, but it was an ideal pretext to divert Chencha's attention onto another topic.†   (source)
  • It was not so much a formal bedroom as a cabin on dry land, which Florentino Ariza had built behind his office in the R.C.C. with no other purpose or pretext than to have a nice little refuge for his old man's loves.†   (source)
  • Hermione allowed Travers to step ahead of her on the pretext of explaining features of the hall to Ron.†   (source)
  • When she answered a second time, he decided to go much further than in their coded Tuesday conversations, and he had a telephone installed next to his bed on the pretext of keeping an eye on the company's daily affairs.†   (source)
  • And he did not know that Blomkvist knew; he could go and see him with the pretext that…well, he wanted to return the key to Gottfried Vanger's cabin.†   (source)
  • When Nacha saw him enter the kitchen, she left, practically at a run, on the pretext of cutting some epazote to add to the beans.†   (source)
  • All the other guests quickly made their excuses, coming up with one pretext or another, throwing heated looks at each other; they too left.†   (source)
  • It was Transito Ariza who took control of the situation and sent the widow to her son's bedroom on the pretext that there was no space in hers, but actually in the hope that another love would cure him of the one that did not allow him to live.†   (source)
  • That's the pretext.†   (source)
  • When Tita walked by the table where he was sitting, he got up and went over to her on the pretext of admiring the baby.†   (source)
  • The book is the pretext.†   (source)
  • She had learned that he was not a messenger, as she had supposed, but a well-qualified assistant with a promising future, and she thought that he had delivered the telegram to her father only as a pretext for seeing her.†   (source)
  • The tragedy was not brought on by the soldiers, but by the mob, and the mob, it must he understood, was the inevitable result of the flawed policy of quartering troops in a city on the pretext of keeping the peace: We have entertained a great variety of phrases to avoid calling this sort of people a mob.†   (source)
  • The plan was that I would–if the conditions and numbers were right–try to lead a Healer or two out of the facility under the pretext that I had an injured friend in my van.†   (source)
  • Among the papers was the draft of a proposed secret treaty between America and the Netherlands, a document of no real significance, but one the British were happy to use as a pretext for a show of angry indignation and threats of war, a possibility the Dutch dreaded as they did no other.†   (source)
  • At about nine o'clock the troops with the least experience, along with the sick and wounded, were ordered to start for the Brooklyn ferry landing, on the pretext that they were being relieved by reinforcements.†   (source)
  • He could not object openly—Cersei had judged that correctly—but he resigned the Handship on some thin pretext and returned to Casterly Rock, taking his daughter with him.†   (source)
  • Though she didn't say and he didn't ask, he knew she would also have called her husband in New York to lay some pretext for her coming absence.†   (source)
  • I called Dr. Cuevas, who came over on the pretext of having tea but was really there to examine Clara.†   (source)
  • "The feast makes a pleasant pretext," Ser Rodrik explained, "but a man does not cross a hundred leagues for a sliver of duck and a sip of wine.†   (source)
  • Cancelling her scheduled lunch on the pretext of a summons from the British delegation — a common occurrence during the round-robin conferences with the People's Republic over the 1997 Treaty — Foreign Service Officer Staples instructed the driver to drop them at the beginning of Food Street in Causeway Bay.†   (source)
  • Finally, with the pretext that it was cooler in his concubine's house, he transferred the small office in which he handled his business.†   (source)
  • All he did was try to maintain a certain distance, on the pretext of being a hopeless bachelor when it came to matters of the heart.†   (source)
  • Then, with the pretext that the animals were losing their fertility, he transferred his barns and stables.†   (source)
  • The doors of the house, wide open from dawn until bedtime, were closed during siesta time under the pretext that the sun heated up the bedrooms and in the end they were closed for good.†   (source)
  • Nana also kept her eye out, on the pretext of serving little cups of coffee, startling the spirits with her starched petticoats and the click of her whispered prayers and loose teeth—not to protect Clara from her own excesses, but rather to make sure no one stole the ashtrays.†   (source)
  • He asked Blanca to fix his clothing on her sewing machine, on the pretext that he had lost some weight, but he wondered whether old Pedro Garcia had set his bones backward and whether that's why he was shrinking.†   (source)
  • Then Dr. Noguera closed the window with the pretext that there was too much sun, and explained to him in simple terms that it was a patriotic duty to assassinate Conservatives.†   (source)
  • However, the tiniest provisions become important when they prevent the need or pretext for gradual, unobserved usurpations of power.†   (source)
  • She would sit through the evening meal without eating, on the pretext that she had a headache, and ask to be excused early from the table; there would be a strange gleam in her eyes and an impatience and eagerness in her motions that he had come to recognize.†   (source)
  • Finally she made use of the American redhead who was spending his vacation in Macondo at that time and with the pretext of learning about new models of cars she had him take her to the garage.†   (source)
  • And the enemies of the Constitution would have many pretexts for raising prejudices against it that might endanger its ratification.†   (source)
  • With Varys whispering in his ear, King Aerys became convinced that his son was conspiring to depose him, that Whent's tourney was but a ploy to give Rhaegar a pretext for meeting with as many great lords as could be brought together.†   (source)
  • The rolls of music that she herself had thrown into the trash with the pretext that they had rotted from dampness kept spinning and playing in her memory.†   (source)
  • When Esteban Trueba realized that behind his back these Contemporaries and Eponyms were breathing through their navels and taking off their clothes on the slightest pretext, he lost his patience and kicked them all out of his house, threatening them with his cane and shouting that he would call the police.†   (source)
  • On the contrary, at a certain moment he seemed so enthusiastic with the idea of a new war that Colonel Gerineldo Marquez thought that he was only waiting for a pretext to proclaim it.†   (source)
  • On the pretext that she had to study late at night, she left the room she had shared with her mother ever since her grandmother died and set up a room on the first floor, facing the garden, so she could let Miguel in through the window and lead him on tiptoe through :he sleeping house to their enchanted lair.†   (source)
  • If Ferula tried to serve his wife a cup of chocolate, he grabbed it from her hands on the pretext that she was treating her like an invalid; if she kissed her good night, he pulled her away with a sweep of his hand, saying that it was not right for them to kiss; if she chose the best portions for her from the serving tray, he rose from the table in a temper.†   (source)
  • It was such an unforeseen attitude that Amaranta Ursula felt humiliated by the idea that she had given her husband the pretext that he had wanted in order to abandon her to her fate.†   (source)
  • He did not have the pretext of climate to hasten their return because nature had endowed him with a colonial liver which resisted the drowsiness of siesta time and water that had vinegar worms in it.†   (source)
  • Days later the woman suddenly called him to her house, where she was alone with her mother, and she had him come into the bedroom with the pretext of showing him a deck of cards.†   (source)
  • But the only reply from the government was the reinforcement of the military guard that had been placed at the door of his house with the pretext of protecting him, and the prohibition of all types of visits, Similar methods were adopted all through the country with other leaders who bore watching.†   (source)
  • Even the proprietress, who normally did not take part in the conversation argued with a madam's wrathful passion that Colonel Aureliano Buendia, of whom she had indeed heard speak at some time, was a figure invented by the government as a pretext for killing Liberals.†   (source)
  • His point of view, contrary to the general interpretation, was that Macondo had been a prosperous place and well on its way until it was disordered and corrupted and suppressed by the banana company, whose engineers brought on the deluge as a pretext to avoid promises made to the workers.†   (source)
  • On Sunday, although no one had revealed it openly, al -though no action on the part of the military had disturbed the tense calm of those days, the whole town knew that the officers were ready to use any manner of pretext to avoid responsibility for the execution.†   (source)
  • With the pretext that his wedding bedroom was at the mercy of the moths in spite of the destruction of Remedios' appetizing dolls, he hung a hammock in the workshop and then he would leave it only to go into the courtyard to take care of his necessities.†   (source)
  • The pretext was offered, in fact, when the president of the republic refused to award any military pensions to former combatants, Liberal or Conservative, until each case was examined by a special commission and the award approved by the congress.†   (source)
  • Convinced that Ursula would carry the secret to her grave, Aureliano Segundo hired a crew of diggers under the pretext that they were making some drainage canals in the courtyard and the backyard, and he himself took soundings in the earth with iron bars and all manner of metal-detectors without finding anything that resembled gold in three months of exhaustive exploration.†   (source)
  • When the table was still raised up on bricks and the chairs put on planks so that those at the table would not get their feet wet, she still served with linen tablecloths and fine chinaware and with lighted candles, because she felt that the calamities should not be used as a pretext for any relaxation in customs.†   (source)
  • Jose Arcadio Buendia did not know at what moment or because of what adverse forces his plan had become enveloped in a web of pretexts, disappointments, and evasions until it turned into nothing but an illusion.†   (source)
  • Every time he saw her, and worse yet when she showed him the latest dances, he felt the same spongy release in his bones that had disturbed his great-great-grandfather when Pilar Ternera made her pretexts about the cards in the granary.†   (source)
  • Kolia, on the pretext that he was busy signalling an approaching train, refused to call the commissar.†   (source)
  • But what pretext could an officer find for transferring a private from his unit, and where, if it were not for disciplinary reasons, could he transfer him?†   (source)
  • An excellent pretext-but a pretext all the same.†   (source)
  • When the weekly totals began to show a decline, he visited Rieux several times on various pretexts.†   (source)
  • Did any of your guests return to this room during the afternoon on any pretext?†   (source)
  • But not a single word had been spoken yet in this oriental assembly, and I had no pretext.†   (source)
  • It was as if for a moment he had forgotten the pretext.†   (source)
  • Say our thief is tampering with the luggage at lunch-time under the pretext of getting out his own.†   (source)
  • So then, if I had dough at least there couldn't be that pretext.†   (source)
  • Her eyes never crossed his and she angled for pretexts to quarrel with him.†   (source)
  • On every kind of pretext she would run away from work and go to the drinking pool, where she would stand foolishly gazing at her own reflection in the water.†   (source)
  • The first sort joke about sex because it gives rise to many incongruities: the second cultivate incongruities because they afford a pretext for talking about sex.†   (source)
  • The two old men faced each other on their knees among the tombs, the small coffin shoved aside like a pretext - an absurd spectacle.†   (source)
  • Stuart Chase and others have come near to claiming that all abstract words are meaningless, and have used this as a pretext for advocating a kind of political quietism.†   (source)
  • The rest of us were constantly being beaten in the most savage way, on the most frivolous pretexts, but never Sebastian.†   (source)
  • Not that he needed a guide to Arroyo Hondo, it was a place especially dear to him, and he was always glad to find a pretext for going there.†   (source)
  • And afterwards I was very glad that the coolie had been killed; it put me legally in the right and it gave me a sufficient pretext for shooting the elephant.†   (source)
  • I went down to the lounge about half past nine on the pretext of getting luggage labels and he was not there.†   (source)
  • A moment later, on some pretext, she would be back into the house, where, with a face contorted by her rising hysteria, to Luke, Eugene, or any sympathetic audience, she would burst out: "You heard that, didn't you?†   (source)
  • She was not even distracted by an officious sacristan who tried to collect a fee for something or other and who, from spite, made her change her place under the pretext of repairing a tile on the floor.†   (source)
  • There were not many occasions when one could give publicity to an architect, and buildings had little news value, but the Banner managed to throw Roark's name at the public under every kind of ingenious pretext.†   (source)
  • The heat and the manual work had even given him a pretext for reverting to shorts and an open shirt in the evenings.†   (source)
  • In those days, before the American occupation, "hunting Navajos" needed no pretext, it was a form of sport.†   (source)
  • Among adults some pretext in the way of Jokes is usually provided, but the facility with which the smallest witticisms produce laughter at such a time shows that they are not the real cause.†   (source)
  • If she had worked in the Records Department it might have been comparatively simple, but he had only a very dim idea whereabouts in the building the Fiction Department lay, and he had no pretext for going there.†   (source)
  • On some suitable pretext Whymper was led through the store-shed and allowed to catch a glimpse of the bins.†   (source)
  • It, too, would be a pretext for memory.†   (source)
  • Although he had a good pretext for coming here, he was haunted at every step by the fear that a black-uniformed guard would suddenly appear from round the corner, demand his papers, and order him to get out.†   (source)
  • I arrived in the neighbourhood of his chateau in the Ardennes but it was some days before I could find a pretext for gaining admission to the house.†   (source)
  • It is not the same thing as being rich himself-in fact I have a little idea that the lady is not very fond of parting with her money, except on a very good pretext.†   (source)
  • On mademoiselle's ingenious pretext I was admitted to the house, and after a brief interview with the dead deputy's mother, who was a wonderfully imposing and aristocratic figure though obviously in failing health, I was made free of the premises.†   (source)
  • When Blanche's husband offered him work, he found some pretext for avoiding it.†   (source)
  • Very likely he had forgotten his pretext for a quarrel.†   (source)
  • When we meet, the others go away on absurd pretexts to leave us alone together.†   (source)
  • It gave her the promise and pretext to keep the children indefinitely.†   (source)
  • What she and I had virtually said to each other was that pretexts were useless now.†   (source)
  • She had a daughter who served her as a pretext for cultivating the society of young men of fashion.†   (source)
  • He lifted his eyebrows with the pretext of a smile as he returned her glance.†   (source)
  • She might have invented a pretext for staying away; she might even invent a pretext now for going.†   (source)
  • The pretext is none of mine; it's hers, and she shall have enough of it.'†   (source)
  • The pretext for this gathering was a false one.†   (source)
  • Make her come here on some pretext or other.†   (source)
  • Every cure furnished the pretext for a good meal: the Bishop did not interfere.†   (source)
  • On some pretext of urgent necessity, he offered two boatmen a dollar apiece to catch up with her.†   (source)
  • Seizing the first pretext, she got up, and with her light, resolute step went for her album.†   (source)
  • On various pretexts they all moved off, and Alice was soon left alone.†   (source)
  • Gride gladly availed himself of the pretext for going to the window to see.†   (source)
  • It might give some heartless people a pretext for treating you with contempt.†   (source)
  • Emma, on the pretext of giving orders, disappeared.†   (source)
  • But now she thought this proposed visit would serve as a pretext for going away.†   (source)
  • That is but the pretext, Amelia, or I have loved you and watched you for fifteen years in vain.†   (source)
  • The Count was a low-lived brute; he had given his wife every pretext.†   (source)
  • Thou canst easily gratify his greed; for think not that I am blinded by thy pretexts of poverty.†   (source)
  • "Yes, but between ourselves," said the princess, "that is a pretext.†   (source)
  • He would if possible never give her a pretext, never put himself in the wrong.†   (source)
  • One must not push too far in descent under pretext of a return to reason.†   (source)
  • It was her pleasure and her vanity to drag in these names on every pretext.†   (source)
  • She would give him many pretexts, she would often put herself in the wrong.†   (source)
  • When she needed to cry, the deceased count would be the pretext.†   (source)
  • Another pretext would be her snuff, which would seem too dry or too damp or not rubbed fine enough.†   (source)
  • Should he give to his cowardice the pretext of patriotism?†   (source)
  • You do more, under the pretext of unmasking yourself, you calumniate yourself.†   (source)
  • What for people in their full vigor is an aim was for her evidently merely a pretext.†   (source)
  • For goodness' sake don't you ever on any pretext set your foot over the threshold at night, for it's as much as your life is worth.'†   (source)
  • It was true that she meant to use the accident of his presence as part of a very definite effect; or that, at least, was the secret pretext she had found for breaking her promise to walk with Mr. Gryce.†   (source)
  • Some stagger about in each other's arms, whispering maudlin words—others start quarrels upon the slightest pretext, and come to blows and have to be pulled apart.†   (source)
  • On the spot, accordingly, in the pleasant hall and with her eyes on me, I, for a reason that I couldn't then have phrased, achieved an inward resolution—offered a vague pretext for my lateness and, with the plea of the beauty of the night and of the heavy dew and wet feet, went as soon as possible to my room.†   (source)
  • Upon the pretext that his tenant needed quiet, he kept him almost in isolation, and Muishkin protested in vain against this excess of zeal.†   (source)
  • But when I came to think the matter over my conscience reproached me bitterly for having on any pretext allowed him to go out of my sight.†   (source)
  • Hawe had used insulting language to the ladies and, according to Ambrose, would have inconvenienced the party on some pretext or other if he had not been sharply silenced by the cowboys.†   (source)
▲ show less (of above)