tortured

English

Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈtɔɹt͡ʃɚd/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈtɔːt͡ʃəd/
• Hyphenation: tor‧tured

Verb

tortured

1. simple past and past participle of torture

Adjective

tortured (comparative more tortured, superlative most tortured)

1. Having been subjected to torture, mental or physical.
   • 1898, H.G. Wells, The War of the Worlds, London: William Heinemann, page 219:

     Those who have escaped the dark and terrible aspects of life will find my brutality, my flash of rage in our final tragedy, easy enough to blame; for they know what is wrong as well as any, but not what is possible to tortured men. But those who have been under the shadow, who have gone down at last to elemental things, will have a wider charity.

2. Involving suffering and difficulty.

   a tortured history

3. Of literature, burdened by unnecessary complexity, obfuscation, abstruseness, etc.

   tortured prose