Library / English Dictionary

    TEMPEST

    Pronunciation (US): Play  (GB): Play

     I. (noun) 

    Sense 1

    Meaning:

    (literary) a violent windplay

    Example:

    a tempest swept over the island

    Classified under:

    Nouns denoting natural phenomena

    Hypernyms ("tempest" is a kind of...):

    windstorm (a storm consisting of violent winds)

    Domain category:

    literature (creative writing of recognized artistic value)

    Derivation:

    tempestuous ((of the elements) as if showing violent anger)

    Sense 2

    Meaning:

    A violent commotion or disturbanceplay

    Example:

    it was only a tempest in a teapot

    Synonyms:

    storm; tempest

    Classified under:

    Nouns denoting stable states of affairs

    Hypernyms ("tempest" is a kind of...):

    commotion; disruption; disturbance; flutter; hoo-ha; hoo-hah; hurly burly; kerfuffle; to-do (a disorderly outburst or tumult)

    Derivation:

    tempestuous (characterized by violent emotions or behavior)

    Credits

     Context examples: 

    It must have been this, I suppose, that stirred in my soul that tempest of impatience with which I listened to the civilities of my unhappy victim; I declare, at least, before God, no man morally sane could have been guilty of that crime upon so pitiful a provocation; and that I struck in no more reasonable spirit than that in which a sick child may break a plaything.

    (The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

    With his thick knotted arms, his thundering voice, and his bristle of red hair, there was something so repellent in the man that the three brothers flew back at the very glare of him; and the two rows of white monks strained away from him like poplars in a tempest.

    (The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

    At length I gathered resolution to address him in a pause of the tempest of his passion.

    (Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

    Henry was alone in it; and his immediate hope of her having been undisturbed by the tempest, with an arch reference to the character of the building they inhabited, was rather distressing.

    (Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)

    I pulled off my shoes and stockings, and, wailing two or three hundred yards, I found the object to approach nearer by force of the tide; and then plainly saw it to be a real boat, which I supposed might by some tempest have been driven from a ship.

    (Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

    I was not surprised, when I ran down into the hall, to see that a brilliant June morning had succeeded to the tempest of the night; and to feel, through the open glass door, the breathing of a fresh and fragrant breeze.

    (Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

    Four days in hell, knocking about in a sort of maelstrom, and the wind a tempest. No sleep for any one. Men all worn out. Hardly know how to set a watch, since no one fit to go on.

    (Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

    There was an occasional tempest, and once Jo marched home, declaring she couldn't bear it longer, but Aunt March always cleared up quickly, and sent for her to come back again with such urgency that she could not refuse, for in her heart she rather liked the peppery old lady.

    (Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

    And when at last, thinking the driver had begun to grow suspicious, he discharged the cab and ventured on foot, attired in his misfitting clothes, an object marked out for observation, into the midst of the nocturnal passengers, these two base passions raged within him like a tempest.

    (The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

    She busied herself with following the aerial creations of the poets; and in the majestic and wondrous scenes which surrounded our Swiss home —the sublime shapes of the mountains, the changes of the seasons, tempest and calm, the silence of winter, and the life and turbulence of our Alpine summers—she found ample scope for admiration and delight.

    (Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)


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