Sample sentences for DELICACY - verbalworkout.com

4 meanings

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1 —as in:
eat the delicacy

Definition

something that is rare or expensive — usually a prized food

Chocolate covered ants are a delicacy of Columbia's Guane Indians.

delicacy = a rare and expensive type of food

Other Uses (with this meaning)

They serve bird nest soup and other Chinese delicacies.

delicacies = rare and expensive types of food

Mathilde suffered ceaselessly, feeling herself born to enjoy all delicacies and all luxuries.
Guy de Maupassant -- The Diamond Necklace

delicacies = things of high quality — such as expensive foods

Ekwefi even gave her such delicacies as eggs, which children were rarely allowed to eat because such food tempted them to steal.
Chinua Achebe -- Things Fall Apart

delicacies = prized foods

She said "Cokes and peanuts" the way you might say "snot and boogers."
August laughed. "They don't know a delicacy when they see one, do they, Lily?"
Sue Monk Kidd -- The Secret Life of Bees

delicacy = delicious food that is rarely available

All year, the Capitol will show the winning district gifts of grain and oil and even delicacies like sugar while the rest of us battle starvation.
Suzanne Collins -- The Hunger Games

delicacies = things that are rare or expensive

He brought delicacies of the gods — wine stolen from Zeus' own stores, the sweetest honey of Mount Hybla, where the bees drink only thyme and linden blossoms.
Madeline Miller -- Circe

delicacies = prized foods

Redd's soldiers helped themselves to wondercrumpets, fried dormice, and whatever other delicacies they could find, and none too delicately shoved them into their mouths.
Frank Beddor -- The Looking Glass Wars

delicacies = prized foods

Her Missionary Society refreshments added to her reputation as a hostess (she did not permit Calpurnia to make the delicacies required to sustain the Society through long reports on Rice Christians); she joined and became Secretary of the Maycomb Amanuensis Club.
Harper Lee -- To Kill a Mockingbird

delicacies = prized foods

He bought his newspaper in one shop, read it with morning coffee in a tiny café that also offered old watercolour paintings for sale; took a turn in the park; shopped for delicacies in the various food shops.
V.S. Naipaul -- A Bend in the River

delicacies = rare and expensive types of foods

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2 —as in:
discuss with delicacy

Definition

care and gentleness — especially speaking or acting with sensitivity and tact

She is admired for her delicacy in negotiations.

delicacy = sensitivity and tact

Other Uses (with this meaning)

If you act like a bull in a china shop, the negotiations will fail. Delicacy is required.

delicacy = sensitivity and tact

. . . it is happy for you that you possess the talent of flattering with delicacy. May I ask whether these pleasing attentions proceed from the impulse of the moment, or are the result of previous study?
Jane Austen -- Pride and Prejudice
Miss Bartlett, though skilled in the delicacies of conversation, was powerless in the presence of brutality.
E.M. Forster -- A Room With A View
I saw a delicacy in him that I had never seen on the coast. His manners were like a form of consideration; and however small the occasion, his manners never failed.
V.S. Naipaul -- A Bend in the River

delicacy = sensitivity and tact

Delicacy to her parents made her careful not to betray such a preference of her uncle's house.
Jane Austen -- Mansfield Park

delicacy = care and gentleness

Mr. Morris, with instinctive delicacy, just laid a hand for a moment on his shoulder, and then walked quietly out of the room.
Bram Stoker -- Dracula

delicacy = care and gentleness

A succulent hash arrived, and Mr. Wolfshiem, forgetting the more sentimental atmosphere of the old Metropole, began to eat with ferocious delicacy.
F. Scott Fitzgerald -- The Great Gatsby

delicacy = sensitivity and tact

It was not an age of delicacy; and her position, although she understood it well, and was in little danger of forgetting it, was often brought before her vivid self-perception, like a new anguish, by the rudest touch upon the tenderest spot.
Nathaniel Hawthorne -- The Scarlet Letter

delicacy = gentleness

I look past her, into the distance as I've been trained to, and her cold glare bores into me with the delicacy of a blunt knife.
Sabaa Tahir -- An Ember in the Ashes

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3 —as in:
offend her delicacy

Definition

the quality of being easily hurt or damaged

(often referring to the fragility of someone's emotional well being when it is easily distressed by something that is offensive or disturbing)

My mother does not watch R-rated movies. She says they offend her sense of modesty and delicacy.

delicacy = fragility of emotional well being that is easily distressed by something that is offensive or disturbing

Other Uses (with this meaning)

The delicacy of the artifacts makes them difficult to move.

delicacy = fragility

There was a certain delicacy to the way he moved—as though he might easily break.

delicacy = fragility

...if you destroy delicacy and a sense of shame in a young girl, you deprave her very fast.
Harriet Beecher Stowe -- Uncle Tom's Cabin

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4 —as in:
delicacy of the brushwork

Definition

pleasant subtlety or fineness

The lacework was done with great delicacy.