Meaning of wretched in English

Table of contents
  1. Pronunciation
  2. Classifying Adjective
    1. Definitions

  1. Pronunciation

    /ˈrɛtʃəd/

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  1. Classifying Adjective

    wretched

    Definitions

    1. of very poor quality or condition

    Examples

    • « deplorable housing conditions in the inner city »
    • « woeful treatment of the accused »
    • « woeful errors of judgment »

    Synonyms

  2. 2. characterized by physical misery

    Examples

    • « a wet miserable weekend »
    • « spent a wretched night on the floor »

    Synonyms

  3. 3. very unhappy

    Examples

    • « full of misery »
    • « he felt depressed and miserable »
    • « a message of hope for suffering humanity »
    • « wretched prisoners huddled in stinking cages »

    Synonyms

  4. 4. deserving or inciting pity

    Examples

    • « a hapless victim »
    • « miserable victims of war »
    • « the shabby room struck her as extraordinarily pathetic- Galsworthy »
    • « piteous appeals for help »
    • « pitiable homeless children »
    • « a pitiful fate »
    • « Oh, you poor thing »
    • « his poor d »

    Synonyms

Famous quotes

  • « Even the most wretched individual of our present society could not exist and develop without the cumulative social efforts of countless generations. »
    Mikhail Bakunin
  • « Hope is the best possession. None are completely wretched but those who are without hope. Few are reduced so low as that. »
    William Hazlitt
  • « How sick one gets of being 'good,' how much I should respect myself if I could burst out and make everyone wretched for twenty-four hours embody selfishness. »
    Alice James
  • « There is no class so pitiably wretched as that which possesses money and nothing else. »
    Andrew Carnegie
  • « Death is easier than a wretched life and better never to have born than to live and fare badly. »
    Aeschylus

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