Crossword clues for sullenness
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Sullen \Sul"len\, a. [OE. solein, solain, lonely, sullen; through Old French fr. (assumed) LL. solanus solitary, fr. L. solus alone. See Sole, a.]
Lonely; solitary; desolate. [Obs.]
--Wyclif (Job iii. 14).-
Gloomy; dismal; foreboding.
--Milton.Solemn hymns so sullen dirges change.
--Shak. -
Mischievous; malignant; unpropitious.
Such sullen planets at my birth did shine.
--Dryden. -
Gloomily angry and silent; cross; sour; affected with ill humor; morose.
And sullen I forsook the imperfect feast.
--Prior. -
Obstinate; intractable.
Things are as sullen as we are.
--Tillotson. -
Heavy; dull; sluggish. ``The larger stream was placid, and even sullen, in its course.''
--Sir W. Scott.Syn: Sulky; sour; cross; ill-natured; morose; peevish; fretful; ill-humored; petulant; gloomy; malign; intractable.
Usage: Sullen, Sulky. Both sullen and sulky show themselves in the demeanor. Sullenness seems to be an habitual sulkiness, and sulkiness a temporary sullenness. The former may be an innate disposition; the latter, a disposition occasioned by recent injury. Thus we are in a sullen mood, and in a sulky fit.
No cheerful breeze this sullen region knows; The dreaded east is all the wind that blows.
--Pope. [1913 Webster] -- Sul"len*ly, adv. -- Sul"len*ness, n.
Wiktionary
n. 1 (context uncountable English) The state or quality of being sullen. 2 (context countable rare English) The result or product of being sullen.
WordNet
n. a gloomy ill-tempered feeling [syn: moroseness, glumness]
a sullen moody resentful disposition [syn: sulkiness, moroseness, sourness]
Usage examples of "sullenness".
Klingsor stood on the balcony, coatless, his bare forearms leaning on the iron railing, and with a touch of sullenness, his eyes hot, read the script of the stars against the pale sky and the gentle lucency on the black, lumpy cloud masses of the trees.
Several months passed, during which she heard nothing from the Marquis de Villeroi, and her days were marked, at intervals, with the phrensy of passion and the sullenness of despair.
They are not with you a morose and gloomy sullenness brooding over imaginary wrongs, and collecting venom and malice from every corner to the heart.
Rome, I was buying olives from the olive vendor, a grumpy, unsunny man whom I was beginning to like for the originality of his sullenness, when I heard Leah scream.
Mama always taught us that what people call stupidity or sullenness in darkies is usually no more than common fear, but all the same I was astonished by his rudeness, and terrified, too, that Papa might assault him on the street.
The habit of associating morose sentiments with any particular kind of scenery only shows that the sources of the sullenness arose in similar visible circumstances.
She had had no real need to turn to in order to achieve the full effect that the Sirius had aimed at, yet from the mute, weary sullenness of her crew and the anxious, laded, harassed look of her officers, every man jack aboard had been hard at it, gilding the lily for this occasion.
His behavior vacillated between an almost unbearable imperiousness when addressing his younger brother and sisters to adolescent sullenness when he gazed at the table where Fara sat with adult members of Council.
At the same moment he felt an essential change in her motion, a dead sullenness: she was going to miss stays.
Karen had clear memories of those days, of his sullenness, his long bouts of drinking, tiptoeing around him lest she set off his temper.