All 7 Uses of
stifle
in
Jane Eyre
- This idea, consolatory in theory, I felt would be terrible if realised: with all my might I endeavoured to stifle it — I endeavoured to be firm.†
p. 20.9 *stifle = suppress (prevent something or decrease its development)
- I was just beginning to stifle with the fumes of conservatory flowers and sprinkled essences, when I bethought myself to open the window and step out on to the balcony.†
p. 166.0
- I comprehended how he should despise himself for the feverish influence it exercised over him; how he should wish to stifle and destroy it; how he should mistrust its ever conducting permanently to his happiness or hers.†
p. 453.8
- As for me, I daily wished more to please him; but to do so, I felt daily more and more that I must disown half my nature, stifle half my faculties, wrest my tastes from their original bent, force myself to the adoption of pursuits for which I had no natural vocation.†
p. 460.1
- What my sensations were no language can describe; but just as they all rose, stifling my breath and constricting my throat, a girl came up and passed me: in passing, she lifted her eyes.†
p. 79.9 *
- As to my own will or conscience, impassioned grief had trampled one and stifled the other.†
p. 370.2
- Having stifled my sobs, wiped my eyes, and muttered something about not being very well that morning, I resumed my task, and succeeded in completing it.†
p. 461.9
Definitions:
-
(1)
(stifle as in: stifling the urge) to suppress (prevent something or decrease its development) -- often political freedom
-
(2)
(stifle as in: the heat is stifling) to make breathing difficult or impossible -- often from heat or humidity
-
(3)
(meaning too rare to warrant focus) meaning too rare to warrant focus:
Much more rarely, to stifle is used in the context of anatomy to refer to a four-legged animal's equivalent of the human knee (the joint between the upper and lower leg).