grim
not to be placated or appeased or moved by entreaty
How often you will meet it
Rank 2,805 of 71,295 words measured. It occurs 5,910 times across 155,370 chapters — 0.003% of every word in the library.
What it means
adjective
- not to be placated or appeased or moved by entreaty also: inexorable, relentless, stern, unappeasable, unforgiving, unrelenting grim determinationgrim necessity
- shockingly repellent; inspiring horror also: ghastly, grisly, gruesome, macabre, sick ghastly woundsthe grim aftermath of the bombing
- harshly ironic or sinister also: black, mordant black humora grim joke
- harshly uninviting or formidable in manner or appearance also: dour, forbidding a dour, self-sacrificing lifea forbidding scowl
- filled with melancholy and despondency also: gloomy, blue, depressed, dispirited, down, downcast gloomy at the thought of what he had to facegloomy predictions
- causing dejection also: blue, dark, dingy, disconsolate, dismal, gloomy a blue daythe dark days of the war
grim in real books
Each sentence below was written by a published author and is taken from a different book in our library. Open one to read the passage it came from, with narration.
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The letter was in his hand, and he looked unusually grim.
The Club of Queer Trades · G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton · Chapter 1
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Delightful for a few months, but very grim all the rest of the year.
The Crown of Life · George Gissing · Chapter 1
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Bobby and Katherine had always been afraid of this great, grim country practitioner who had attended their childish illnesses.
The Abandoned Room · Wadsworth Camp · Chapter 1
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Too well they knew the gaunt gray horse The grim witch-hunter rode The pale Apocalyptic beast By grisly Death bestrode.
Pennsylvania Pilgrim, and other poems Part 6 From — Volume I · John Greenleaf Whittier · Chapter 1
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I chafed at first, and then, under the hypnotising effect of routine, gradually began to find a grim satisfaction in the life.
Ethan Frome · Edith Wharton · Chapter 1