despairful

English

Etymology

From despair +‎ -ful.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /dɪˈspɛːfəl/
• Hyphenation: des‧pair‧ful

Adjective

despairful (comparative more despairful, superlative most despairful)

1. Characterised by despair; hopeless.
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book II, Canto XII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:

     […] wretches, whose vnhappie cace, / After lost credite and consumed thrift, / At last them driuen hath to this despairefull drift.

   • 1896, H[erbert] G[eorge] Wells, “Chapter 5”, in The Island of Doctor Moreau (Heinemann’s Colonial Library of Popular Fiction; 52), London: William Heinemann, →OCLC; republished as The Island of Doctor Moreau: A Possibility, New York, N.Y.: Stone & Kimball, 1896, →OCLC:

     The captain went forward interfering rather than assisting. I was alternately despairful and desperate.

Derived terms

• despairfully
• despairfulness