All 50 Uses

despair
in
Frankenstein - 1831 version
(Auto-generated)

But he is generally melancholy and despairing, and sometimes he gnashes his teeth, as if impatient of the weight of woes that oppresses him.
p. 27.4

despairing = without hope
Having conquered the violence of his feelings, he appeared to despise himself for being the slave of passion; and quelling the dark tyranny of despair, he led me again to converse concerning myself personally.
p. 29.9

despair = hopelessness
You have hope, and the world before you, and have no cause for despair.
p. 30.2 *
But when he entered, misery and despair alone welcomed him.
p. 34.1
His daughter attended him with the greatest tenderness, but she saw with despair that their little fund was rapidly decreasing and that there was no other prospect of support.
p. 34.3

despair = distress (at not knowing how to improve a bad situation)
I need not describe the feelings of those whose dearest ties are rent by that most irreparable evil, the void that presents itself to the soul, and the despair that is exhibited on the countenance.
p. 45.1

despair = hopelessness
Clerval, who had watched my countenance as I read this letter, was surprised to observe the despair that succeeded the joy I at first expressed on receiving new from my friends.
p. 75.2

despair = distress
But I did not feel the inconvenience of the weather; my imagination was busy in scenes of evil and despair.
p. 78.7

despair = hopelessness
It was an historical subject, painted at my father's desire, and represented Caroline Beaufort in an agony of despair, kneeling by the coffin of her dead father.
p. 79.6
How kind and generous you are! every one else believes in her guilt, and that made me wretched, for I knew that it was impossible: and to see every one else prejudiced in so deadly a manner rendered me hopeless and despairing.
p. 82.7

despairing = distressed (at not knowing how to improve a bad situation)
I had before experienced sensations of horror, and I have endeavoured to bestow upon them adequate expressions, but words cannot convey an idea of the heart-sickening despair that I then endured.
p. 87.2

despair = hopelessness
Despair!
p. 89.2

despair = hopeless
Anguish and despair had penetrated into the core of my heart; I bore a hell within me which nothing could extinguish.
p. 89.8

despair = hopelessness
Thus spoke my prophetic soul, as, torn by remorse, horror, and despair, I beheld those I loved spend vain sorrow upon the graves of William and Justine, the first hapless victims to my unhallowed arts.
p. 90.9
The blood flowed freely in my veins, but a weight of despair and remorse pressed on my heart which nothing could remove.
p. 93.2
Now I could only answer my father with a look of despair and endeavour to hide myself from his view.
p. 94.3
There is an expression of despair, and sometimes of revenge, in your countenance that makes me tremble.
p. 96.6

despair = distress (at inability to fix a bad situation)
Sometimes I could cope with the sullen despair that overwhelmed me, but sometimes the whirlwind passions of my soul drove me to seek, by bodily exercise and by change of place, some relief from my intolerable sensations.
p. 97.1

despair = hopelessness
Then I spurred on my animal, striving so to forget the world, my fears, and more than all, myself—or, in a more desperate fashion, I alighted and threw myself on the grass, weighed down by horror and despair.
p. 98.7
After many fruitless attempts to gain admittance to the prison, he found a strongly grated window in an unguarded part of the building, which lighted the dungeon of the unfortunate Muhammadan, who, loaded with chains, waited in despair the execution of the barbarous sentence.
p. 126.1
I resolved, at least, not to despair, but in every way to fit myself for an interview with them which would decide my fate.
p. 133.4

despair = give up hope
Do not despair.
p. 136.2 *
Rely, therefore, on your hopes; and if these friends are good and amiable, do not despair.
p. 136.4

despair = hopelessness
I know not; despair had not yet taken possession of me; my feelings were those of rage and revenge.
p. 138.1
But this was a luxury of sensation that could not endure; I became fatigued with excess of bodily exertion and sank on the damp grass in the sick impotence of despair.
p. 138.8
I continued for the remainder of the day in my hovel in a state of utter and stupid despair.
p. 140.5
I did not know the names of the towns that I was to pass through, nor could I ask information from a single human being; but I did not despair.
p. 141.7

despair = give up hope
The child still struggled and loaded me with epithets which carried despair to my heart; I grasped his throat to silence him, and in a moment he lay dead at my feet.
p. 144.7

despair = distress
I gazed on my victim, and my heart swelled with exultation and hellish triumph; clapping my hands, I exclaimed, "I too can create desolation; my enemy is not invulnerable; this death will carry despair to him, and a thousand other miseries shall torment and destroy him."
p. 144.9

despair = hopelessness
But busy, uninteresting, joyous faces brought back despair to my heart.
p. 163.6
The wretch saw me destroy the creature on whose future existence he depended for happiness, and with a howl of devilish despair and revenge, withdrew.
p. 171.6

despair = distress (at inability to improve a bad situation)
The night passed away, and the sun rose from the ocean; my feelings became calmer, if it may be called calmness when the violence of rage sinks into the depths of despair.
p. 174.1

despair = hopelessness
I had before regarded my promise with a gloomy despair as a thing that, with whatever consequences, must be fulfilled; but I now felt as if a film had been taken from before my eyes and that I for the first time saw clearly.
p. 175.5
This idea plunged me into a reverie so despairing and frightful that even now, when the scene is on the point of closing before me forever, I shudder to reflect on it.
p. 176.9

despairing = without hope
Little did I then expect the calamity that was in a few moments to overwhelm me and extinguish in horror and despair all fear of ignominy or death.
p. 178.9

despair = hopelessness
Sometimes, indeed, I felt a wish for happiness and thought with melancholy delight of my beloved cousin or longed, with a devouring maladie du pays, to see once more the blue lake and rapid Rhone, that had been so dear to me in early childhood; but my general state of feeling was a torpor in which a prison was as welcome a residence as the divinest scene in nature; and these fits were seldom interrupted but by paroxysms of anguish and despair.
p. 187.2
Yet one duty remained to me, the recollection of which finally triumphed over my selfish despair.
p. 187.3
My father yielded at length to my desire to avoid society and strove by various arguments to banish my despair.
p. 189.6

despair = distress (at inability to improve a bad situation)
And when time shall have softened your despair, new and dear objects of care will be born to replace those of whom we have been so cruelly deprived.
p. 195.1
If you knew what I have suffered and what I may yet endure, you would endeavour to let me taste the quiet and freedom from despair that this one day at least permits me to enjoy.
p. 197.1

despair = hopelessness
While I still hung over her in the agony of despair, I happened to look up.
p. 200.1
The deep grief which this scene had at first excited quickly gave way to rage and despair.
p. 206.1

despair = distress (at inability to fix a bad situation)
Let the cursed and hellish monster drink deep of agony; let him feel the despair that now torments me.
p. 206.5

despair = hopelessness
Sometimes the peasants, scared by this horrid apparition, informed me of his path; sometimes he himself, who feared that if I lost all trace of him I should despair and die, left some mark to guide me.
p. 207.2

despair = lose hope
On hearing this information I suffered a temporary access of despair.
p. 210.2

despair = hopelessness
Despair had indeed almost secured her prey, and I should soon have sunk beneath this misery.
p. 210.8
I had not despaired, nor had I yet conceived the idea of returning if set free.
p. 217.2

despaired = lost hope
Years will pass, and you will have visitings of despair and yet be tortured by hope.†
p. 215.9
Even the sailors feel the power of his eloquence; when he speaks, they no longer despair; he rouses their energies, and while they hear his voice they believe these vast mountains of ice are mole-hills which will vanish before the resolutions of man.†
p. 216.3
These feelings are transitory; each day of expectation delayed fills them with fear, and I almost dread a mutiny caused by this despair.†
p. 216.5

Click For
Best Example Sentences
From Other Sources
Grouped by 3 Meanings

Definitions:

(1) (despair as in: she felt despair)
hopelessness; or distress (such as extreme worry or sadness from feeling powerless to change a bad situation)
(2) (despair as in: do not despair)
lose hope or feel distress
(3) (despair as in: she was the despair of the team)
something that causes hopelessness or great distress
(4) (meaning too rare to warrant focus)

despair in Frankenstein - 1831 version (Auto-generated)

despair
in
Frankenstein - 1831 version
(Auto-generated)