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trenchant

used in a sentence
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Definition clear, strong, and sharply focused — especially of criticism
  • Her most trenchant criticism was aimed at the President.
  • She surprised everyone with an especially trenchant argument.
  • trenchant distinctions between right and wrong
  • Many timid remonstrances had she uttered to George in behalf of her brother, but the former in his trenchant way cut these entreaties short.
    Thackeray, William Makepeace  --  Vanity Fair
  • I found their simple scale of honour was based mainly on the capacity for inflicting trenchant wounds.
    Wells, H.G.  --  The Island of Doctor Moreau
  • My sister had a trenchant way of cutting our bread-and-butter for us, that never varied.
    Dickens, Charles  --  Great Expectations
  • But once he found in a fold of the matting a half-smoked cigar, and this he ground beneath his heel with a green and trenchant oath.
    Henry, O.  --  The Four Million
  • Make soft thy trenchant sword; for those milk paps
    Shakespeare, William  --  The Life of Timon of Athens
  • He has built flats on its site, his motor-cars grow swifter, his exposures of Socialism more trenchant.
    Forster, E. M.  --  Howards End
  • He heard these words in his father's trenchant voice, and trembled, and then dodged the thought.
    Stevenson, Robert Louis  --  Tales and Fantasies
  • He could fancy their headlines, imagine even their trenchant paragraphs.
    Oppenheim, E. Phillips  --  The Kingdom of the Blind
  • The second lycanthrope made a trenchant point.
    Cassandra Clare  --  City of Ashes
  • The trenchant divisions between right and wrong, honest and dishonest, respectable and the reverse, had left so little scope for the unforeseen.
    Edith Wharton  --  The Age of Innocence
  • I found their simple scale of honour was based mainly on the capacity for inflicting trenchant wounds.
    H.G. Wells  --  The Island of Dr. Moreau
  • Silence followed the scout's trenchant speech.
    Zane Grey  --  The Thundering Herd
  • A second less and the trenchant blade had shorn through his heart.
    Bram Stoker  --  Dracula
  • But they also embodied a trenchant 'social criticism.'
    Jostein Gaarder  --  Sophie's World
  • When Castleton finished his narrative there was a trenchant silence.
    Zane Grey  --  The Light of Western Stars
  • Knell had cut out with the trenchant call, and stood ready.
    Zane Grey  --  The Lone Star Ranger
  • There was a trenchant, focused look to his eyes, as if a notion or thought had taken a profound hold over him and he was useless before it.
    Chang-rae Lee  --  A Gesture Life

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