Library / English Dictionary

HOPELESSLY

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (adverb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Without hope; desperate because there seems no possibility of comfort or success

Example:

'I must die,' he said hopelessly

Classified under:

Adverbs

Antonym:

hopefully (with hope; in a hopeful manner)

Pertainym:

hopeless (without hope because there seems to be no possibility of comfort or success)

Sense 2

Meaning:

In a hopeless manner

Example:

he is hopelessly romantic

Classified under:

Adverbs

Domain usage:

colloquialism (a colloquial expression; characteristic of spoken or written communication that seeks to imitate informal speech)

Pertainym:

hopeless ((informal to emphasize how bad it is) beyond hope of management or reform)

Sense 3

Meaning:

In a dispirited manner without hope

Example:

the first Mozartian opera to be subjected to this curious treatment ran dispiritedly for five performances

Synonyms:

dispiritedly; hopelessly

Classified under:

Adverbs

Pertainym:

hopeless (without hope because there seems to be no possibility of comfort or success)

Credits

 Context examples: 

"You ain't goin' back on me, Mart?" he queried hopelessly.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

Of course, legally, we are putting ourselves hopelessly in the wrong; but I think that it is worth it.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Wholly untaught, with faculties quite torpid, they seemed to me hopelessly dull; and, at first sight, all dull alike: but I soon found I was mistaken.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

He tried to soothe his nose with his tongue, but the tongue was burnt too, and the two hurts coming together produced greater hurt; whereupon he cried more hopelessly and helplessly than ever.

(White Fang, by Jack London)

Now I was ragged, wanting to sell Dora matches, six bundles for a halfpenny; now I was at the office in a nightgown and boots, remonstrated with by Mr. Spenlow on appearing before the clients in that airy attire; now I was hungrily picking up the crumbs that fell from old Tiffey's daily biscuit, regularly eaten when St. Paul's struck one; now I was hopelessly endeavouring to get a licence to marry Dora, having nothing but one of Uriah Heep's gloves to offer in exchange, which the whole Commons rejected; and still, more or less conscious of my own room, I was always tossing about like a distressed ship in a sea of bed-clothes.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

Perhaps—his heart almost stood still at the—wild thought—perhaps they were ordering an article from him; but the next instant he dismissed the surmise as hopelessly impossible.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

There were, as he had said, marks upon the bed, but they were hopelessly blurred and vague.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

In similar manner his attempt to study evolution had been confined to a hopelessly technical volume by Romanes.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

And bigger than such things was life, of which they were densely, hopelessly ignorant.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

"They ain't no use in me askin' you to change your mind an' hit the road with me?" Joe asked hopelessly.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)